More than 65% of SA police officers take no joy in the job, internal survey shows

Amid calls for leadership reform within the South African Police Service (Saps), an internal survey by its research division shows more than 65% of police officers are not “looking forward to going to work when they wake up in the morning”.

Saps research division’s Brigadier Kobus Schwartz, section head, specialised and tactical research, said 1 600 members had taken part in the survey and while 71% of participants believed they excelled at their jobs, 60.94% said they did not receive proper recognition for their work.

“This comes with 51.7% of police officers saying they do not have adequate resources to perform their daily duties,” he said.

“More than two-thirds of officers face a number of issues before they can do their work, either the radio is not working, there aren’t enough vans to go out and serve the way you need to…”

Schwarz was talking during a webinar on evidence-based policing South Africa webinar, facilitated by the Institute for Security Studies (ISS).

He said: “We need to be careful of underlying issues within the Saps. With more than 61.63% of the respondents thinking Saps was not winning the war against crime, it was demoralising many officers because it seemed their efforts meant nothing.”

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Schwartz said these issues were coupled with 54.49% saying they were dissatisfied with their salaries and at least 51.30% were not achieving what they had wanted to achieve at their age. A total of 50.88% disagreed that Saps cared about their well-being. Another 25.41% were neutral and 21.74% agreed.

The manager of the Crime Hub at the ISS, Lizette Lancaster, said South Africa had a serial crisis of police leadership and “desperately needed urgent leadership reform, assessment on competency, capability and lifestyle audits”.

“We really need to see all the ranks, from captains and up in the position, are qualified to manage,” she added.

Following a crescendo of calls for Police Minister Bheki Cele to be fired – which included those coming from the Democratic Alliance’s #CeleMustGo campaign and Action Society, Lancaster said it was hard to “divorce Cele from politics, which was one of the reasons for the Saps crisis”.

“The question we rather have to ask is what needs to happen, which people need to be appointed in which positions to oversee the reform of the police service, and what is required to do so,” she said.

“There are many good men and women still in the police service, getting increasingly demoralised because of competing attention and that’s what we need to look at – the coordinated policing plans to address the different priorities.”

Annual Auditor-General report

On Wednesday, the annual report of the Auditor-General SA (AGSA), Predetermined Objectives 2021-2022, was presented to the police portfolio committee.

The report revealed 712 Saps-owned firearms had been reported lost or stolen in 2021-22 “due to the escalation of crime against members, including, but not limited to robbery in townships, housebreaking, theft from dwellings, as well as negligence by members”, the report stated. Only 508 were allowed for.

A total of 215 identifiable stolen or lost Saps-owned firearms were recovered, in 2021-22 – 378 less than the set increased target of 593. It also seemed someone might have been glossing over what actually was going on in the Saps.

The AGSA reported the “achievements reported in the annual performance report materially differed from the supporting evidence provided” for visible policing. The Saps claimed 8.78% (22 244 from a total of 253 428) of DNA intelligence case exhibits had been processed within 90 calendar days.

The police also reported that 731 564 cases from a total of 743 574 results of trial (not guilty/ withdrawn) had been updated within 20 calendar days. Except, for both DNA results and case finalisations, the AGSA reported supporting evidence provided “materially differed from the reported achievement, while in other instances, AGSA was unable to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence”.

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“This was due to the lack of accurate and complete records,” said the AGSA. It also found reporting about contact crimes “materially differed from the supporting evidence provided”.

The detection rate for contact crimes was 46.36%, or 376 784, from a total of 812 808, not achieving the set increased target of 55.77%, and the detection rate for contact crimes at the 30 high contact crime weight stations was 33.5%, or 40 362 from a total of 120 498, not achieving the set increased target of 40%.

– reitumetsem@citizen.co.za