One of the striking things about South Africa is how little interest the ruling African National Congress (ANC) has shown in transforming certain key institutions of the country. Oh, there have been big changes in personnel, yes, because the ANC has focused, and continues to focus, on demographic transformation. Institutional transformation, however, has been a different matter.
I am thinking in particular of the South African Police Service (SAPS). That it needs reform is widely accepted. Unfortunately, a lot of the debate seems domi- nated by silly irrelevancies, especially arguments about ‘civiliani- sation’ and ‘militarisation’. There seems to be a strange belief in some circles in South Africa that military-style ranks means militarisation and that militarised police forces are less professional that ‘civilianised’ police forces. Both these propo- sitions are nonsense.
To take the second proposition first, there are many police forces around the world that are explicitly militarised – that is, they are legally defined as military forces – and of excellent quality. It is generally accepted that the best uniformed police force in Latin America is Chile’s Carabineros, which is legally part of the country’s armed forces (although they no longer report to the Minister of Defence). It is also generally agreed that Italy’s best police force is the Carabiniere, which is again an explicitly military force, and again part of the country’s armed forces, with national defence as well as policing tasks (it even has its own paratroop battalion!)
Contrariwise, it is not difficult to find civilian police forces around the world that are of poor quality and lacking professionalism. Many state police forces in India fall into that category. In Latin America, many countries have civilian investigative police forces that are totally separate from their uniformed police forces. The quality of these forces ranges from the excellent to the awful.
Nor does having military ranks mean a police force is militarised. It may come as a surprise, but many, if not most, American state police/highway patrol forces use military ranks, generally trooper, corporal, sergeant, lieutenant, captain, major, lieutenant-colonel and colonel, but there are, of course, many variations. However, no US police force has any grades of the rank of general. (Interestingly, Brazil’s militarised uniformed state police forces also have colonel as their highest rank.)
So, please, let us get on to the real issues about police reform. I am not going to propose any solutions, because the first thing to do is to ask the right questions. And I will give what I think are some of the key questions that need to be asked.
The most fundamental question is: should the SAPS exist in its present form at all? South Africa is one of the very few democracies of its size (demographically and geographically) to have a single national police force. Usually, it is only democracies with small populations (millions rather than tens of millions) and/or are small geographi- cally that have single national police forces.
In English-speaking countries, policing tends to be decentralised on a territorial basis (with some specialised national forces or agencies), while Latin countries tend to have separate, parallel national police forces (either a national uniformed force and a national detective force, or a civilian force that polices cities and a militarised force that polices small towns and rural areas). Some Latin countries, for example, Italy, have a series of parallel national police agencies. Thus, assuming the Commonwealth pattern is most appropriate, should policing in South Africa be decentralised with separate provincial and metropolitan city forces, complemented by a national detective agency and a uniformed border police (which could retain the SAPS name and also provide public order policing support to the other agencies)?
Should the procedure for the appointment of senior police officers, especially the national commissioner, be changed? For example, should candidates be interviewed by Parliament?
The SAPS is often seen as top heavy in terms of rank structure. Should the number of senior ranks be cut? Should the SAPS or any successor agencies have generals at all? And should additional junior ranks be created? (For example, should the rank of lance-sergeant, abolished in 1994, be brought back?)
One final point: I have never met a SAPS officer, of any cultural background or language group, who has not been professional and helpful, and often with a good sense of humour! Reform should also help and benefit the men and women of what is an all-too-thin blue line.