4 JULY 2024

Greetings to the House Chairperson

Members of the executive – Minister and Deputy Minister

The National Commissioner

Honourable Members

We welcome and support the budget vote for police, civil secretariat and IPID as it is anchored by the National Development Plan, aligned to the ANC manifesto commitments which include intensifying the fight against crime, strengthening our response to Gender based violence and femicide, keeping our homes and streets safe, protecting our boarders and creating employment opportunities.

Drugs

The 2025/26 budget and revised annual performance plans indicate that the directorate for priority crimes has increased its budget allocation for the thorough   and responsive investigation of crimes, in an effort to reduce organized crimes of drug syndicates, and this will be done through the Narcotics Intervention Strategy and National Drug Master Plan.

The fight against drugs is a difficult one but one we cannot afford to lose, and that is why we need to improve our oversight mechanisms and call for stricter border controls, harsher sentences, and the deployment of specialized crime intelligence units to attend to the issue of drugs.

The South African Police Services (SAPS) continues its nationwide SHANELA operations with intensified operations across all provinces to prevent and combat crime.  They have achieved remarkable successes which stem from proactive policing tactics. We welcome the launch of operation Shanela 2 in Western Cape which has resulted in many drug related arrests over the past two weeks.

Although we acknowledge the work done under operation shanela but maintain that this is not enough. Hot spot areas that are nortorious for drug dealing and gangsterism need a more focused and specialized units to deal with the deeply entrenched criminal networks.

The numerous and significant drug seizures by authorities at international airports and other ports of entries indicate that there is a lucrative market in south Africa from international drug syndicates. It is quite evident that the intelligence is on the ground and police officers are hard at work in clamping down the flow of drugs whether it is from within the country or outside the border, we seen a commitment to dislodge drug networks even going as far as establishing, working relations with international law enforcement authorities in the cases of international/ cross border smuggling.

We further encourage the police to conduct routine checks, searches and seizures because from time to time we hear of fatal road accidents because someone was heavily intoxicated by drugs or other substances. We remain very clear in our call to declare any form of intoxication on public roads a criminal offence. In this breath we intensify our campaign and call up on the liquor boards, municipalities and community members to work closely with the police by ensuring that licenses are adhered to.

Gender Based Violence; Femicide

Gender based violence continues to plague South Africa and is a national pandemic that devastates individuals, communities and families.

We note that most police stations across the country have complied with the establishment of the family violence, child protection and sexual offences units that are specifically established for the purposes of investigation and prosecution of sexual crimes, assault and murder. We are still concerned that not all police stations have a dedicated GBV desk and victim friendly rooms and lack of standardization of these victim support centers across the provinces.

The status of the forensic science laboratories and continued reported DNA backlogs remains worrisome and threatens the administration of justice to victims of gender-based violence due to lack of evidence. In this financial year we want to see the case backlog being resolved, we want to see partnerships with private forensic science laboratories and we want to see more personnel trained in that specific area of DNA evidence.

We are encouraged by the mobilizations around some of the most outrageous gender-based violence and femicide cases the country has witness over the past couple of months. We would like to reiterate that the best interest of the child must always take precedence in line with the children’s rights and rights of the child as set out in the constitution.

It is in this breath that we welcome the launch and signing ceremony of the Collaborative Implementation Protocol between the South African Police Service and the Department of Basic Education. This is a significant milestone in the broader collective mission to build safe, secure and nurturing environments for every learner across our country. The Program aims to strengthen Safe Schools Committees, link schools to local police stations– this ensures immediate access to law enforcement resources and facilitates communication and collaboration. This is a commendable proactive step from the SAPS.  We need to see more visible and proactive policing in deterring GBV.

Rural Safety and Stocktheft

Servicing rural areas remains a challenge for the police due to the geographical locations. By design the isolated-ness and vast spread-out design of farms and rural areas make them more opportunistic to violent crimes.

Geographically, farms and rural areas are very diverse, with difficult roads, mountains very large and expansive areas. These areas are often serviced by one nuclear police station which is not adequately resourced to service all the areas and provide a timely response.  It is in this breath that we continue to reiterate the need for adequate budgeting, capacitation and resourcing of rural police stations.

We require adequate resource allocation to rural police stations and stock theft units, and we need these to be included in the National Resource Plan of the SAPS. We need adequate vehicles and crime prevention equipment e.g., police in metros can drive smaller vehicles while in rural areas they would require lager vehicle and more animal power to do the job. We also call for community collaborations, community policing forums and working relations with the traditional authorities to expand the police reach. The success of the rural safety strategy requires a greater coordination between police, farm owners and farm workers, traditional leaders and members of the community.

As the ANC government we deplore the cold-blooded killings that have been taking place on farms and rural areas across the country. We must never be comfortable with normalizing farm and rural murders and never characterize them as yet another feature of South African life.

Beyond the immediate human suffering and lack of stability and security; the killings in the farming communities cause a severe disruption to our economy. Farms employ a sizeable number of the population.

We remain concerned with the very violent acts of stock theft and murders taking place particularly in the Eastern Cape, Free State, Limpopo.  The stability of our society should not be marked by how many criminals we apprehend but should be measured by its deterrence and low levels of crimes.  As a deterrence, we need to encourage the branding of livestock as this assist with identification and convictions.

On the view that stock theft in South Africa is an organised crime, we call on the police to take seriously and investigate the allegations of police who are suspected to be working with these criminals. We need to restore public confidence in policing services.  The police cannot be part of the problem!

Conclusion

The ANC supports this budget vote. Thank you.