South Africa's police: at times proud, at times shamed by the work they do

Most South African police officers view their job as primarily just that -
a job and a means to survive.
GCIS

Police officers are central to modern states and societies, including South Africa. But contrary to popular belief, the standard model of policing - random patrol, rapid response and follow up investigation - has limited impact on general crime.

Instead, crime and violence are shaped by a myriad of factors including: in utero stress; childhood loss of a caregiver, neglect and malnutrition; untreated mental health and cognitive disorders; stark income and opportunity inequality and related constructs of and damage to masculinities; and early exposure to violence, including at home and school. About much of this, police alone can do little.

Rather, many South African police officers are the products of the same forces that shape the “criminals” against whom they are pitted.

In 2012/13 I spent eight months shadowing SAPS officers as they went about their work at four stations: two in Cape Town (one poor township, one affluent city) and two in the Eastern Cape (one rural town, one rural village, both poor). Aware of the limits of policing, I wanted to explore who officers thought they were – the stories they told themselves about themselves – and how these shaped their work. My findings have just been published in the book, Police Work and Identity.

So what did I find?

Accidental officers

Born and raised in the poverty stained shadow of South Africa’s minority wealth, most officers I met found themselves in the SAPS after original aspirations had slipped beyond reach. Some told stories of having disliked or been in conflict with the SAPS before signing up.

Yet, once inside, given a gun and uniform and asked to do the dirty work of a fragile and anxious democracy, they found themselves rewriting their self-narratives. They told themselves the SAPS was not ideal, but it was not bad either. It offered them secure employment, a decent salary and, often, interesting and rewarding work in a country where these are rare.

And so, for most officers a job in the SAPS is primarily just that, a job - a means to strive and survive in contexts of great precarity. The meaning and income the work brings to officers’ lives is usually more important to them than the work they carry out. Consequently, they seek first to please managers, and so to ease the pressures placed on them.

They enact institutional performances that promote the myth that the SAPS is a rational, effective, evidence based and rule-bound organisation consisting of well-trained officers performing common sense crime prevention tasks. This, while hiding the grimy by products of police work. Through official reports and statements, and carefully choreographed public performances, the SAPS and its officers present a strategically crafted façade behind which they cocoon themselves and seek to build their lives on the precarious socio-economic terrain of contemporary South Africa.

Because officers are aware of their limits, and that the SAPS’ public face is part fiction, some officers seek to distance their identity from the organisation. Instead, they present themselves in private as what might be thought of as “accidental police officers”, people who had hoped for more in life and who thus deserved more respect and dignity than the South African public gave them. But, with prospects of comparable financial remuneration and job security outside of the SAPS unlikely for most, they simultaneously and contradictorily invest in and protect the SAPS image. This is achieved both through dedication to legitimate task, and by ignoring abuse by colleagues.

Incongruence

While officers aspired to lives characterised by middle class materialism, few had the money to do so. Instead they deferred their dreams to their children, investing in their education, while sharing what little remained with networks of precarious kin.

Some officers invested in more than their immediate relatives. They volunteered their time and money to support youth in their communities who they believed to be at risk. Like the skollies (the colloquial name for thugs) they hunted at work, the teens reminded officers of themselves.

By investing in them officers hoped to deflect the teens from the violence of the criminal justice system. In a sense, they offered them carrots so that they might avoid becoming the objects of the violence through which some officers asserted their right to manhood and respect on the job.

A notable portion of the police behaviour I observed was in congruent with the imagined ideals of an exemplary police service. In less orderly spaces – the township and rural town for example – police were more likely to disregard traffic laws, litter, speak their prejudice, and resort to violence.

Their turning to such behaviour in such spaces has its roots in the disparate ways the apartheid state governed Black and White space, and the opposition to state law and authority this fostered. Extended into the democratic era, it seems that disorderly space encourages disorderly police conduct, while order encourages police compliance. As such, police reproduce both order and disorder in their work, rather than enforcing order.

Raised on the periphery

Who do SAPS officers think they are and how does it shape police practice?

Like so many South Africans, they are men and women born and raised on the periphery, chasing a vision of a more prosperous future. At times, proud, at times, shamed by the work they are required to do, they are nourished by the knowledge that while they may not be able to make South Africa safe, they can provide themselves and those they care for, with a better life than the one they were born into.

In the meantime, they do what they must do to get through the day, hold fast to the story they tell themselves about themselves, and with it secured, strive to colonise the future with a vision that is golden.

Andrew Faull, Independent Researcher and Research Associate, University of Cape Town

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

South Africa's ANC is celebrating the year of OR Tambo. Who was he?

Oliver Reginald Tambo served as ANC president from 1967 to 1991.
Reuters

Oliver Tambo’s name and reputation are lauded, not least because he succeeded, remarkably, in keeping the African National Congress (ANC) together as a liberation movement during an exile lasting 30 years. Despite this legacy, the ANC, now South Africa’s governing party, has seen a year culminating in what is, arguably, its greatest crisis. Today, factions within the ANC nostalgically point to the example of Oliver Reginald Tambo , or OR as he was affectionately known in party circles.

Evidence of systemic corruption and factionalism for personal gain within the ANC are blamed for the failure to deliver improved living conditions to the poorest communities. The loss of three major metropolitan municipal councils in the industrial heartland testifies to diminished confidence in the ANC.

By contrast, in the year of his centenary, Oliver Tambo is held as an exemplar of integrity, personifying the ideal of a leader who for 50 years selflessly served the movement, consistently holding up the goals of a humane and caring society.

But who was this much talked about Tambo? And what lessons can be learnt from his leadership?

Exile

In 1960, after the Sharpeville massacre, then ANC President Chief Luthuli instructed Tambo to leave South Africa as an international diplomat of the ANC. His task was to mobilise a worldwide economic boycott.

With hindsight it was a prescient judgement call. The military wing of the ANC Umkhonto we Sizwe was launched a year later and within two years leaders of the ANC were facing charges of treason in the Rivonia Trial. The trial, which stretched through 1963-1964, led to life sentences for the leaders of Umkhonto we Sizwe, which included Walter Sisulu, Nelson Mandela, Govan Mbeki and Ahmed Kathrada.

Tambo’s task was to alert the world to the horrors of apartheid South Africa, and to seek assistance and support from newly independent states in Africa. It was to be more than 30 years before he returned home in December 1990. During this time, his integrity combined with his keen intellect and natural warmth impressed many people in diverse countries around the world.

Consensus seeker

Tambo was a careful and astute listener. He followed the indigenous African consensus system of decision making, crafting a conclusion that included at least some of the opinions of all participants.

He believed that the ANC should maintain the “high moral ground” and that it should be a broad umbrella under which all enemies of apartheid could shelter and enrich the movement, irrespective of their political beliefs. He was also cautious, likening the challenge of the liberation struggle to the traditional “indima” method of ploughing a very large piece of land. He explained at a Sophiatown meeting in 1953.

There’s a point where you must start. You can’t plough it all at once – you have to tackle it acre by acre…

One of Tambo’s strengths was his constructive and creative response to criticism. In 1967, for example, following the failure of Umkhonto we Sizwe cadres to reach the borders of South Africa after a battle at Wankie in “Rhodesia” (now Zimbabwe), Chris Hani and others, disillusioned with the leaders’ lethargy, released an angry memorandum. In an interview I did with Hani in Johannesburg in 1993 he admitted: “We blew our tops.” They accused the leadership of Umkhonto we Sizwe and the ANC of getting too comfortable and losing their appetite to return home – they had become “men in suits, clutching passports”.

The response by the leadership was outrage – the Secretary-General Alfred Nzo called for Hani’s execution for treason. But Tambo immediately began organising a conference of elected representatives of the branches around the world. A message was sent to Robben Island to inform ANC leaders jailed there, including Nelson Mandela, of this development.

It was time for frank conversation and a comprehensive, considered assessment. The outcome was the historic and constructive conference at Morogoro in Tanzania. The conference took on a more inclusive and democratic direction for the ANC, foregrounding the political aims over the military, and identifying the importance of mobilising workers at home.

Challenging 1980s

In the 1980s Tambo was faced with a more serious challenge. International attention against apartheid was growing; he was travelling extensively, persuading ordinary people to undermine apartheid by boycotting its products and banks and denying it arms. Alarmed, the apartheid regime sent spies into ANC camps on the continent, infiltrating top committees in Lusaka and other ANC structures.

The panic that ensued turned the spotlight on the flaws of the Umkhonto we Sizwe leadership. Human rights abuses of suspected spies and “ill-disciplined cadres” led to unlawful deaths and executions.

Tambo’s cautious response was criticised by the leadership of both ANC intelligence and Umkhonto we Sizwe for “impeding investigation” into the spies, owing to “his sense of democracy”. The chief culprits of these human rights abuses were formerly trusted peers of Tambo. He faced the dilemma of blowing the ANC wide apart if he challenged them. Instead, he resorted to the compromising strategy of redeploying them to other sections of the movement, such as education – perhaps leaving an unfortunate legacy for today’s ANC.

Enduring legacy

Tambo was to set in motion a process that culminated in South Africa’s democratic constitution. He:

• subscribed Umkhonto we Sizwe and the ANC to the Geneva Convention, which imposed a strict adherence to human rights.
• set up a commission of trusted senior comrades to look into the conditions in the ANC’s camps in Africa as well as abuses. The commission’s report was highly critical.
• summoned an consultative conference in Kabwe in 1985 that reaffirmed ANC’s humanist values, addressed gender inequalities and formally accepted whites in official positions.
• appointed the movement’s top legal minds to research and craft a constitution for the ANC; it was inspired by the Freedom Charter, which had been drawn up in 1956 after extensive consultation with ordinary people. It opened with the ringing words:

South Africa belongs to all who live in it.

South Africa’s new democracy essentially incorporated many of the clauses in the charter’s the path-breaking 1996 constitution.

Tambo’s insights remain relevant

Reporting to his first conference inside South Africa in December 1990 after the unbanning of the ANC, Tambo warned that “suspicions will not disappear overnight, the building of the South African nation is a national ask of paramount importance.

And he warned:

The struggle is far from over: if anything, it has become more complex and therefore more difficult.

He also reflected that "we were always ready to accept our mistakes and correct them.”

Faced by crises in the ANC, Tambo had always been ready to listen, responding constructively and creatively with new policies to meet the challenges of the time.

This is the enduring legacy of Oliver Tambo: many seasons later, many continue to gain insights and learn relevant lessons from his responses to the universal, human condition of our time. But whether they heeded this call is a moot point:

I have devotedly watched over the organisation all these years. I now hand it back to you, bigger, stronger - intact. Guard our precious movement.

Luli Callinicos, Researcher and founder member of the History Workshop, University of the Witwatersrand

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

Timol inquest opens new door to justice against apartheid atrocities

Bishop Desmond Tutu during South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission process.
Reuters

A powerful legal precedent that promises to see the reopening of other apartheid era crimes has been set in motion thanks to anti-apartheid activist Ahmed Timol’s family. They pushed for a new inquiry into Timol’s death, in 1971, while in police custody. An inquest held a year later found that he committed suicide while in detention. Now a judge has found that Timol was pushed to his death. The outcome refocuses the spotlight on how societies deal with authoritarian pasts.

In 1989 the Prime Minister of Poland, Tadeusz Mazowiecki, famously called for a “thick line” to separate the past and current political dispensations in Poland. The country was emerging from more than 40 years of communist rule that had been toppled by a popular uprising. Mazowiecki called for those who had been in power to be absolved of responsibility for their crimes to enable Poland to move forward.

South Africa, meanwhile, opted for a trade-off between culpability and truth after the fall of apartheid. Apartheid era offenders were required to give full disclosure of their crimes in exchange for amnesty. This was done under the auspices of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).

The TRC built on the precedent of similar commissions set up in South American countries that had been through military rule. The TRC gave South Africa great international attention as it was viewed as a stellar success. As a result South Africa has been held up as a benchmark of how to deal with post conflict situations.

Ahmed Timol.
Ahmed Timol Family Trust

The model has been applied in different scenarios, ranging from Ireland’s sectarian conflict to Canada’s treatment of its First Peoples.

But more than 20 years after the formation of the TRC South Africans have become increasingly restive about its success. Critics say that rather than achieving truth and reconciliation, truth was sacrificed for reconciliation.

Dealing with the past

The transition in South Africa was informed by the 1980s series Transitions from Authoritarian Rule, edited by Guillermo O’Donnell, Philippe C. Schmitter and Laurence Whitehead, in the wake of authoritarian regimes collapsing in Latin America.

In comparing these transitions, they spelt out the steps societies would take in the future. Beginning with liberalisation, where general rights would be extended to all, they predicted that societies would then move to democratisation, where political rights would be democratised. The last step, socialisation, would provide social and economic equality.

As Wits University academic David Everatt has observed, this reasoning looks increasingly determinist. This is because it is obvious that South Africa and other post-authoritarian regimes have struggled to match the steps of liberalisation and democratisation with socialisation.

In effect, the steps set out in the Transitions series were also advocating for a “thick line” approach to dealing with the past. This underplayed the collective psychological trauma borne by those emerging from authoritarian societies, as was the case for black South Africans.

But the fundamental criminality of the apartheid system has provided ample grounds for families of victims to reopen inquests.

The desire of individual families, such as the Timols, to get to the truth of the death of their loved ones – and if possible, to see those responsible prosecuted – has ensured that further cases will be opened.

It has by no means been smooth sailing though: take the case of Neil Aggett, the trade unionist who died in police detention in 1982. A biography on Aggett written by Beverley Naidoo in 2012, Death of an Idealist, led to an article in a local newspaper exposing how one of Aggett’s main interrogators, Stephan Whitehead, had gone on to enjoy a successful career in the security forces after 1994.

The Neil Aggett Support Group – formed by his friends, family, lawyers and activists – wrote an open letter to Jeff Radebe, the then-Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development in February 2013. They called for the prosecution of Whitehead, who did not apply for amnesty to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. But the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) failed to take action.

Their experience mirrored that of Timol’s family who had faced obstacles at every step. Timol, a South African Communist Party member, died in very similar circumstances to Aggett’s at the same John Vorster Square in 1971.

Imtiaz Cajee, Ahmed Timol’s nephew, during the inquest into his death.
ANA/Jacques Naude

The Timol family saw an application they filed in 2003 turned down by the NPA. In 2016 the family presented new evidence that finally led the NPA to reopen the inquest later that year.

The Timol family have finally won what they fought so hard to achieve. The judge’s finding that Timol was pushed to his death has set a powerful legal precedent that promises to see other apartheid era crimes reopened.

To some extent the atrocities of apartheid have been contained for the past 20 years as a result of the country’s truth and reconciliation process. But the Timols, in their search for justice, have reminded South Africans that there can be no thick line separating the past from the present.

Ian Macqueen, Lecturer, Department of Historical and Heritage Studies, University of Pretoria

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

Spike in Listeria infections in South Africa: why it matters

shutterstock.

Listeria is an organism that contaminates food and can result in pregnant women going into premature labour or even losing their babies. The Conversation Africa’s Health and Medicine Editor Candice Bailey spoke to Kerrigan McCarthy from the National Institute of Communicable Diseases about listeriosis and why it needs attention.

What is listeriosis and why is it dangerous?

Listeriosis is a serious bacterial infection caused by the rod shaped bacteria listeria monocytogenes. The bacterium is spread when people eat food contaminated with the bacterium. The most common foods to be contaminated are raw or unpasteurised milk as well as soft cheeses, or vegetables, processed foods and ready-to-eat meats and smoked fish products.

Infection with listeria bacteria results in mild to severe gastroenteritis. In people with weak immune systems it can lead to meningitis or septicaemia. And in pregnant women, listeriosis can result in a miscarriage or stillbirth, premature delivery, or meningitis in the newborn – leading to with permanent disability.

Listeria bacteria are found in the environment – for example in water and in the soil. This means that animals and vegetables can become contaminated at any time and that, as a result, anyone can get listeriosis. But there are certain groups that are at higher risk of severe disease: these include newborns, the elderly, pregnant women and their unborn babies; and those with underlying conditions such as HIV, diabetes, cancer, chronic liver or kidney disease.

Pregnant women are particularly prone because pregnancy causes a natural reduction in the strength of the immune system.

Why are the numbers rising?

In South Africa, the first documented outbreaks of listeriosis were in 1977. Between August 1977 to April 1978, 14 cases were reported in the Johannesburg area.

Since then, sporadic cases have occurred throughout the country. For example, between January 2015 and September 2015 seven cases were reported at a tertiary hospital in the Western Cape Province.

Over the last few months the National Institute for Communicable Diseases has received reports of a marked increase in the number of cases across the country, but particularly in the Gauteng Province, South Africa’s smallest but most densely populated province.

There have been 190 confirmed cases across the country this year. In Gauteng, the population incidence rates have increased from two per million to eight per million. The highest incidence has been recorded in the City of Johannesburg at 12 cases per million. This is not as high as the number of people who get meningococcal meningitis or pulmonary tuberculosis, but the consequences are just as serious.

Of the 122 cases in Gauteng, over 60% are newborn babies that have been infected.

The institute is trying to establish what the source of the infection is so that measures can be put in place to prevent further cases. Mothers who have been infected with the bacteria are being interviewed and the institute is also engaging with the food service quality industry.

What are the signs and symptoms?

Listeria can survive in fridge temperatures of 4°C. The infection incubates for between three and 70 days. In healthy adults, symptoms are usually mild and may include fever and sometimes nausea or diarrhoea.

In high-risk patients, the spread of the infection to the nervous system can cause meningitis leading to headaches and confusion, a stiff neck and convulsions. Bacteraemia – when the bacteria is found in the blood – may also occur.

Gastroenteritis due to listeria does not require treatment. But meningitis or septicaemia as a result of listeria can be life-threatening and should be treated with intravenous antibiotics.

What are the challenges in dealing with listeriosis?

Outbreaks of listeria in food are common across the world. Outbreaks of listeriosis across the world present the same problem: that the source of contaminated food is difficult to identify. There are two reasons for this.

Firstly, the incubation period of 70 days makes it difficult to track what the patient ate and therefore to identify the contaminated food.

And secondly, once the food source is narrowed down, tests need to be conducted on the range of possible foods to establish which is the implicated one. Only once authorities are able to identify the source are they able implement measures to prevent further cases.

How can we protect ourselves from this infection?

There is no vaccine or pre-exposure prophylaxis that can prevent infection. The main preventive measure is good basic hygiene, and proper, safe food preparation and storage.

Unlike most other food borne pathogens, Listeria monocytogenes can grow in refrigerated foods that are contaminated. To prevent this, fridge temperatures should be set below 4⁰C; and freezer temperatures below -18⁰C.

Those at high risk of listeriosis should avoid:

• Raw or unpasteurised milk, or dairy products that contain unpasteurised milk,
• Soft cheeses like feta, goat cheese and brie,
• Foods from delicatessen counters like prepared salads and cold meats that have not been heated and reheated adequately,
• Refrigerated pâtés

Additional measures include thoroughly cooking raw foods from animal sources, such as beef, pork or poultry. Raw fruit and vegetables should be thoroughly washed before eating. And surfaces where food is prepared should be decontaminated regularly, particularly after preparing raw meat, poultry and eggs, including industrial kitchens.

Kerrigan McCarthy, Head of the Outbreak Response Unit, National Institute for Communicable Diseases

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

What's at stake in South Africa's new finance minister's first budget

Reuters

There’s a great deal hanging on South Africa’s 2017 medium term budget policy statement. Three factors are at play: there is political turmoil around the governing African National Congress, the country’s economy is performing poorly and this is the first budgetary statement from the new Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba. The Conversation Africa’s Sibonelo Radebe asked Jannie Rossouw to layout his expectations.

What keeps you up at night in relation to this medium term budget?

The single most worrying factor is the lack of economic growth South Africa faces. Growth has slowed down significantly in recent years and the economy flirted with recession after shrinking during the last quarter of last year and the first quarter of this year. The economy did bounce back into positive growth during the second quarter but the outlook remains unimpressive. Only 0.5% growth is expected for 2017 and less than 2% over the medium term.

Owing to this lack of growth, unemployment is on the increase – it now stands at a staggering 27% – while government revenue is under pressure. It also implies that the government’s burden on the economy (for instance total government debt as percentage of gross domestic product, orDebt/GDP ratio) will increase.

Government’s debt to GDP ratio is currently budgeted to level out around 50%. This is to be welcomed because any increase in the ratio increases the interest burden.

But if slow growth and revenue shortfalls persist, government debt will increase. The debt to GDP ratio will be on its way to 65% of GDP in the medium term.

And should the combination of low growth and growing government expenditure continue after the period of this medium term statement (2017/18 - 2020/21), the debt/GDP ratio might be on its way to 100%. This projection really stresses one of the most worrying factors that has to be addressed in this statement: Limiting the level of government debt before it reaches this level.

In other countries where this level has been exceeded, severe adjustments had to be forced on their economies. Take the Irish Republic case. Remuneration levels and employment numbers in the civil service had to be cut dramatically to deal with the Irish government debt crisis.

There is a new finance minister in place and he comes with shifting political dynamics. How do you rate him and what do you expect from him?

It is difficult to rate the new minster, given that he’s only been in the job since April and the fact that he has not yet tabled his first budgetary statement. The only statement against which his performance can really be assessed is the 14-point plan he announced in July 2017.

We’ll be watching the medium term statement for his report back on progress in implementing it.

But Gigaba comes with worrying political dynamics, including accusations that he is party to corruption.

And its difficult to separate him from the history of bad policy options of the African National Congress which has delivered the prevailing lacklustre economic performance. The fiscal crisis facing South Africa is a direct result of these policies.

How significant is the medium term budget policy statement?

It’s very important as it provides an overview of government’s plans for expenditure and for raising revenue over the next three years. A three year view is significant because it provides insight into planned government expenditure and indicates expected tax increases that South African taxpayers have to face. It also informs decisions of the credit rating agencies about South Africa’s fiscal stability.

The statement forms the basis of the annual budget of government revenue and expenditure that is tabled in Parliament in February each year.

The statement is the first formal opportunity after the tabling of the annual budget where the government reports on the actual performance of revenue raised in comparison to budgeted revenue and of actual expenditure in comparison to budgeted expenditure.

This reporting by government gives an early indication of expectations for the main budget in February. For instance, if government revenue is underperforming, the expectation is that taxes will be increased the following February. Indeed a tax increase might materialise in this medium term statement.

What in you view will be key focus areas in this medium term statement?

As South Africa’s economic growth is currently lower than the forecast used for the 2017/18 fiscal year, tax collection has come under pressure. A revenue shortfall is expected for this fiscal year. The medium term statement is when the size of the shortfall will be formally disclosed.

Given expectations of a substantial shortfall, South Africans should brace themselves for substantial tax increases in the main budget in February 2018. The fiscal crisis might even be so serious that the government might decide to divert from previous practice and announce tax increases in this medium term statement.

Like any other government in the world, it raises revenue through taxes and use this revenue to fund its expenditure. If revenue exceeds expenditure, the difference must be borrowed, which adds to the level of government debt, or expenditure must be cut.

One of the biggest budgetary headaches is the ailing state owned enterprises. What should be done?

Government is really throwing good money after bad by using public money to bailout ailing state owned enterprises. I have said a long time ago that South African Airways should simply be given away. This is a much cheaper option for the taxpayer instead of never ending bailouts. The South African government should reassess its holding of state owned enterprises and close, sell or give away those that are no longer financially viable. Such action will remove a large financial burden on the South African taxpayer.

Jannie Rossouw, Head of School of Economic & Business Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand

This article was originally published on The Conversation.