Cop shops (mis)managed
2010-03-18 22:45
Cape Town - Station commanders are failing in their most basic duty of exercising control over police officials, dockets, firearms and vehicles.
Weekly inspections are "generally disregarded" and national orders are ignored. Furthermore, station commanders and other heads have a "serious lack" of skills and knowledge.
These damning findings are compiled in a report about what is happening at 733 of the 1 116 police stations in the country by the police's national inspectorate which - between April and December last year - completed countrywide inspections to determine whether station commanders are maintaining discipline and whether police stations are being properly managed.
Bheki Cele, national chief of police, made the report available two weeks ago upon request from the Parliamentary portfolio committee for police.
Investigative work poor
The majority of the inspections were done at police stations in Gauteng (316), Mpumalanga (120) and the Free State (66).
It paints a bleak picture of the day-to-day activities at police stations and the lack of the most basic control and management measures.
The inspectorate found that detectives' investigative work is "poor" in all the provinces, among other reasons due to a lack of training and expertise. In KwaZulu-Natal, the poor performance is attributed to "dereliction of duty".
There is poor supervision and control of the use of police vehicles; while the Management of and accounting for police firearms is insufficient in Gauteng, Limpopo, the Free State, North-West and the Eastern Cape.
Due to the inefficient allocation of staff, some stations in the Western Cape don't have enough officials to provide 24-hour service.
Furthermore, detectives in Limpopo, the Northern and Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal never provide feedback to complainants about the progress of investigations. If this does happen, it is not being recorded in dockets.
Cele said in his letter to the portfolio committee that the inspectorate's findings were sent to the provincial police chiefs at the end of December "for corrective actions" where necessary.
Earlier this week the committee objected to the return to the apartheid police's ranks to restore discipline within the police. Committee members pointed out to top officials that only good management can get the Saps back in shape.