SAPS fight stats, not crime

Brigadier Nkoshilo Hosiah Seimela has been working for the Crime Research and Statistics unit under the Strategic Management arm of SAPS for the past 14 years. The unit is responsible for generating and interpreting the crime statistics the SAPS uses and Seimela is its acting head.

Seimela explained that statistics gathered by SAPS are often affected by subjective decisions made by police officers required to capture those statistics.

One example recounted involved an incident when a resident of Khayelitsha was robbed by young men carrying firearms. They took his cellphone and wallet. When he went to the Site B police station, the officers said that they could not open a case as the victim was unable to identify the perpetrators and did not know the serial number of his cellphone.

Seimela said this was clearly an incident of robbery with a firearm. He suggested that the officers were reluctant to open a case because it would negatively affect their crime statistics.

“I think what they are trying to do is to – sometimes they fight figures. They are not fighting crime. That’s the reason why they did not register that crime … You can have the figures going down, but the crime levels are still very high. So there’s a distinction between the statistics and the reality on the ground. So this time they are fighting the figures, not the reality,” he said.

Advocate Norman Arendse said crime statistics gathered at the station level are subject to manipulation by police officers. This behaviour, of refusing to open a case, is not unheard of and the concern is that it may be a widespread practice.

Ardense referred to a report compiled by retired Dr Major General Chris de Kock, former head of Crime Research and Intelligence, which stated: “The crime profile of Khayelitsha has actually not changed over the past 12 to 13 years. It still remains a dominantly social contact crime station”.

The situation in Khayelitsha has been this way since 1999, Arendse quoted.

The same report states: “This type of crime is less policeable in terms of the conventional policing methods or procedures such as focus patrols, roadblocks, cordon and search operations. It still exhibits a complex mixture of factors influencing its crime situation such as a high influx of people not knowing one another, and a result lack of social cohesion, unemployment, dire poverty, a lack of proper housing, privacy and recreational facilities and activities. The way to address the situation also still remains the same. Only an integrated government/ community response can really address the high levels of social contact crime”.

SAPS statistics have been a contentious issue in South African discourse. They should be read cautiously and with an understanding of how they are created.

The Commission of Inquiry continues to hear from Senior SAPS officials for the next 7 days, ending Phase 1 of hearings on 1 of April with Provincial Commissioner Major General Arno Lamoer.