SAPS Fixed Establishment Document: Parliamentary replies reveal shockingly outdated approach to policing
28 September 2016
Recent replies to Parliamentary questions revealed that the Minister of Police, Nkosinathi Nhleko, and his outdated Fixed Establishment Document, is out of touch with the needs of our local SAPS stations.
Replies to my questions revealed that the Edenvale SAPS detective division is 100% under resourced, while the Sebenza SAPS detective division is under resourced by 42%.
Furthermore it has become clear that Minister Nhleko has no coherent plan to beef up the number of detectives at our police stations. Instead, he resorts to using the outdated Fixed Establishment Document - which determines the number of police officers each police station should have – as his excuse for the shortfall.
In addition, Minister Nhleko intends to use “surplus” Visible Policing to increase the number of detectives to that of the “Fixed Establishment”.
It is incomprehensible that Minister Nhleko thinks it will be possible to move surplus visible police officers to the detective units. Every one of the police stations I have visited have no surplus visible policing. In fact, they are all severely under resourced when it comes to visible policing.
It must also be noted that even if the Minister brings the strength of all the detective divisions to that of the Fixed Establishment, it will not reduce the excessive number of dockets that detectives are investigating to that of the maximum of between 45 cases each.
In fact, based on the Fixed Establishment, Edenvale Police Station would only receive one additional detective while Sebenza would astonishingly lose two detectives.
In terms of cases being investigated, Edenvale SAPS have 36 detectives who are investigating 90 cases each. However, based on the Fixed Establishment document Edenvale is only entitled to one extra detective, however if the maximum cases of 45 were to be implemented, another 36 detectives are needed.
Sebenza currently have 19 detectives investigated 63 cases on average, while the Fixed Establishment states that Sebenza should only have 17 detectives meaning they would lose 2, however if the maximum cases of 45 were to be implemented they would need 27 detectives, or an additional 8 detectives.
This clearly highlights that the Minister and his top brass do not have a grasp on reality.
What is needed is a total review of the Fixed Establishment formula in order to increase detective numbers to bring the number of cases down to 45 cases per detective.
Failure to do so is a failure to take crime seriously and brining culprits to book.
Issued by Mike Waters, Constituency Head: Lethabong, Deputy Chief Whip in Parliament, 28 September 2016
