Long road ahead to create a professional SAPS

Prof. Bheki Mngomezulu

On Wednesday 14 May 2025, the Cabinet approved the Draft National Policing Plan (NPP).

This policy aims to create professional and quality policing, provide efficient and effective policing service delivery, improve legitimacy and trust between communities and the police, and build a strong and ethical leadership, management and governance infrastructure architecture within the SAPS. Certainly, the policy is hailed by some but will be questioned by others – especially those who have seen other good policies failing to produce the intended results due to a plethora of reasons. 

Addressing the media soon after the approval of this Plan, the Minister in the Presidency, Khumbudzo Ntshavheni stated that the newly approved Plan outlines the government’s plans to address shortcomings in the mandate of the South African Police Service (SAPS) to combat crime as a response to previous failures.

The motivating factor behind the drafting and subsequent adoption of the NPP is to address issues such as the small number of police stations across the country which makes it difficult for the SAPS to serve the South African public. The second factor is the capacity issue. It was felt that the SAPS needed serious capacitation if it were to execute its mandate well. 

The third and most important issue which necessitated the drafting of the NPP was crime. Both national and provincial police officials constantly present shocking crime statistics. The impact of crime cuts across various spheres of life. These include but are not limited to the tourism sector, investment and economic growth, and South Africa’s public and global image.

Presenting its 2023/2024 study report, the UN Office for Drugs and Crime placed South Africa’s murder rate at 45 per 100,000. This saw South Africa being ranked the second highest globally when compared to other countries that make their crime statistics available for the public to see. While it is true that these figures fluctuate from one reporting period to another, they are a cause for concern.

 Given these issues, it was justifiable to craft and adopt this Draft NPP as the first step towards addressing the challenges enumerated above. There is still a long way to go in dealing with these issues even after the final NPP has been adopted by both the Cabinet and later by parliament.

There are specific issues which have the potential to derail any plans to improve the operation of SAPS. One of them is corruption among law enforcement agencies – including SAPS members and the entire justice system. If officials at different levels within the justice system continue to take bribes from criminal suspects, no initiative – not even the NPP – can change the current situation facing the SAPS and the entire justice system.

Another important factor could be the austerity measures imposed by national government. In each budget speech, the nation is constantly asked to brace itself for the turbulent. The same applies to different government departments – including the SAPS.

Therefore, passing the NPP without an accompanying budget would be a futile exercise. Any plan to increase the number of police stations would be scuttled if there is insufficient or no budget made available to achieve that goal. Even maintaining some of the already existing police stations is currently a challenge.

Even if the number of police stations were to be increased, they would still need well-trained and capacitated police officers. Without sufficient funds, this would be difficult to achieve at best or impossible.

With regards to crime, which was identified as the third important driving factor for the drafting of the NPP, the situation gets even worse. There are various reasons for that.

The first reason is that the same police officers who are supposed to root out crime are also directly involved in the same practice. Every year, no less than 5,500 cases of police criminal offences are reported. This makes a mockery of the entire process of crafting the NPP.

According to the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID), of the 5,500 cases, more than 3,500 of them are for police torture and assault. This points to another problem – lack of proper training. In a worst-case scenario, this could be a deliberate decision by some police officers to disobey the law they already know. In that case, even proper training would not solve the problem. 

Building trust between the police and communities is not something that can be achieved overnight. There is a trust deficit between the two parties. Reports of women who are raped at police stations after going there to open cases do not give hope. The cases of witnesses and whistleblowers who are killed by the perpetrators after the police have leaked information about their identities dampen the spirit and discourage others from coming forward with information.

The idea of producing ethical leadership is a noble one. But no money can instil ethical behaviour. Recent decisions by the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) raise doubts about the possibility of instilling ethical leadership in the SAPS. These include the Phala Phala matter involving President Cyril Ramaphosa and the acquittal of televangelist Timothy Omotoso. 

Another challenge which goes beyond the SAPS is lack of policy implementation, monitoring and evaluation. South Africa has many good policies on paper. Sadly, these fail to produce the intended results due to failure to implement and monitor them. If that is the case, what will be different with the NPP?

Therefore, while the Cabinet’s decision to approve the Draft NPP should be applauded since it had good intentions, celebrating this move and hoping for the best would be premature and unjustifiable. As the saying goes, ‘Experience is the best teacher.’ From experience, we have seen good policies failing to produce good results.

Regarding the SAPS, the problem is even worse. Until corruption and criminal activities are rooted out, no policy – no matter how great it can be – will change the current situation. The SAPS’ shortcomings need more than just a policy. The NPP is a good start but not a panacea.

* Prof. Bheki Mngomezulu is Director of the Centre for the Advancement of Non-Racialism and Democracy at Nelson Mandela University.

** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL, Independent Media or The African.