CHAPTER 3: SAPS restructuring in 2001

CHAPTER 3
SAPS Restructuring in 2001

SAPS` COSTLY RESTRUCTURING
A Review of Public Order Policing Capacity

 

 

Monograph No 138, October 2007

 

Bilkis Omar

The policing of public order in South Africa has long been surrounded by controversy. The Riot Control Units, which were established under the banner of the South African Police (SAP) in the 1970s in response to the revival of the anti-apartheid resistance movements, remained in place until 1995 when they were merged into the new SAPS. In 1992, the Internal Stability Division (ISD) was formed for the purpose of ‘policing of unrest through proactive (preventive) and reactive measures and the prevention of crime in unrest-plagued areas’ (Meyer 1999). The Internal Stability Division adopted a paramilitary approach and became notorious for its use of abusive policing methods. Controversy led to the unit being disbanded in 1995, and its members being re-absorbed into the SAPS.

 

After 1994, policing in general, but particularly public order policing, changed dramatically in its approach. In 1996, the Public Order Police (POP) unit was conceived under new SAPS policy. The focus of the unit was the ‘management’ of crowds as opposed to the ‘control’ of crowds. This initial overhaul of the public order units was clearly important to overcome the problems of the past. However, ongoing debate and internal issues within the SAPS meant that the policy was only adopted in 2002 into SAPS Standing Order 262 on Crowd Management during Gatherings and Demonstrations (Omar 2006:9). 

 

In 2002 the SAPS management decided on another structural change to    the Public Order Police units. What had been the primary focus of the    units – the management of crowds and events – became a secondary function, while combating and preventing crime became the primary focus. The units were decentralised to the area level, reporting to the area commissioner, and were deployed to attend to area priorities on a daily basis. Renamed as Area Crime Combating Units (ACCUs) these units began assisting police stations and other units in VIP protection, domestic violence complaints, stop and search, roadblocks, vehicle check points, patrolling of malls and streets, monitoring hijack hotspots, and other crime combating functions.

 

The argument given by the SAPS management for the change was that public protests had decreased with the demise of apartheid, and the new Public Finance Management Act 1 of 1999 demanded ‘value for money’ budgeting (SAPS Policy 2004:1). The SAPS had also just launched its National Crime Combating Strategy (NCCS) in 2000 to combat crime in hotspots and was looking for more resources to ensure the success of the initiative. The Area Crime Combating Units could help to ensure that this was possible.

 

While the broadening of the Area Crime Combating Units’ responsibilities made financial and operational sense, the concern was that a shift to crime combating would result in a dilution of the specialised crowd control skills of these units.

 

This study set out to determine what impact the change in function had on the activities and effectiveness of Area Crime Combating Units.

Views on the impact of restructuring

 

The research results suggest that the change impacted differently on different units. Members of the Johannesburg ACCU said that the change was one of name only, because they had in fact always been involved in crime combating activities such as stop and search, roadblocks, vehicle check points, and patrolling of malls and streets. The perception of members of the East Rand unit was different, however. Both unit members and managers stated that their crime combating activities had increased with the restructuring. While this increase was noted by the members, it did not appear to concern them because they did not believe it detracted from their capacity to perform their original public order duties.

 

To understand the different perceptions of the two units, some background is needed. As mentioned earlier, the effect of the restructuring (from Public Order Police units to Area Crime Combating Units) was to decentralise the units to the area level (they had formerly reported to the provincial commander of operational response services at the provincial office). For the Area Commissioners, the ACCUs represented a large pool of human resources that could be utilised for crime combating operations.

 

The increase in the level of crime combating activities noted by the East Rand unit after the 2001 restructuring can therefore be attributed to a new trend whereby area commissioners’ utilised ACCU members largely for crime combating operations. By contrast, for the Johannesburg public order police, tackling criminal activities had been commonplace before the creation of the ACCUs in 2002.

 

It is also interesting that many members of the ACCUs attributed the restructuring (from POPs to ACCUs) to a change in crowd management tactics. Members spoke about ‘negotiating with the people instead of being aggressive’, and the ‘rights of people to march’, and ‘using different types of equipment’. The changes in the style of crowd management (more democratic and internationally acceptable) had in fact been introduced in 1997 in a SAPS policy document, but it was only in 2002 that the document directive was adapted as standing Order 2623, and then introduced to the members (Omar 2006:9).

The ACCUs’ workload: Frequency of protest marches after 2001

 

The study also set out to determine if protest marches had increased or decreased after 2001 in the Johannesburg and East Rand policing areas. Issues of service delivery and other local government-related problems like transport were featuring prominently at this time, and trends were suggesting an increase in protest marches. More protest marches would have meant that the SAPS management would have had to revisit the roles and functions of the ACCUs.

 

A study of the SAPS Incident Registration Information System, Business Intelligence System (IRIS-BIS), a system that records public events and marches, confirmed that protest marches between 2002 and 2005 had increased from 6 757 in 2002 to a high of 10 162 in 2005 – an increase of 50 per cent (Figure 3). This was significant because it meant that the specialist crowd management capability of the ACCUs was required more than ever.

 

 

Research showed that protest marches in the Johannesburg area had increased. This was not surprising as protest marches generally tend to take place in areas where there are offices of both provincial and local government departments, which facilitates the handing over of petitions to relevant government officials.

 

In the East Rand area by comparison, protest marches had not increased much between 2002 and 2005; in fact many members stated that the rate had decreased. The East Rand area (including the newly incorporated Vaal and North Rand areas) does not house many government head offices, but because it has many industries and businesses, disputes do arise, mostly in the form of strikes and protests at specific times of the year. Wage increases are generally negotiated between March and June, and a higher occurrence of protest marches at this time is not unexpected. Other disputes that are commonplace in the East Rand are taxi strikes and service delivery  protests.
 
Whatever the trends in crowd management incidents in specific areas, the 2002 decision to form the ACCUs was based on a police management perception that the number and intensity of major demonstrations, marches, and incidences of labour unrest throughout the whole the country had decreased since 1994. Apart from a sharp increase in 1998, this was indeed the case (Figure 3).

 

After 2002, however, the picture changed dramatically. Data relating to incidents of violence or unrest at mass gatherings between 2002 and 2005 show a massive increase of 64 per cent over the period (Figure 4). This change necessitated an assessment of whether the ACCUs, in the light of the restructuring they had undergone, had managed to retain the ability and skills to deal with the increase in number of marches, and especially the increase in the violent nature of the marches, in addition to carrying out their intensified crime combating duties. It also raised the question of whether the crowd management function was being neglected in favour of crime combating activities. 

 

 

One of the goals of the ACCUs at this point of the restructuring was ‘to maintain public order by combating serious and violent crime, policing public gatherings, rendering specialised operational support to other units/components/divisions and ensuring effective information management’ (SAPS Policy 2004:1). The changes from Public Order Police units to ACCUs saw the Gauteng units decentralised to seven policing areas. This meant that each ACCU had to focus on a specific policing area where it would perform both crime combating and crowd management functions.

 

The demands on the units were further increased because their members were serving on both provincial and area task teams, as well as assisting neighbouring policing areas and performing border duties and other special duties. The number of ACCU police members on duty was further depleted because some members were also on annual leave or on sick leave.

 

Given the multiple tasks that the units had to deal with, a shortage in human resources was not unexpected. Despite this and despite the increase in the number of marches, members in both the Gauteng and East Rand ACCUs believed that they managed the operations of marches quite well. Even when asked to assist other areas, they said they were able to cope.

 

The research showed that in terms of priority, crowd management was always seen as the foremost priority for the ACCUs, even when they were deployed to crime combating operations. Only a few Johannesburg ACCU members and managers stated that crowd management had been neglected in favour of crime prevention and other area-level priorities.

 

However, despite their statements that they were able to manage the operations of marches, respondents indicated that juggling dual functions was not an easy task. While officially ACCU members were meant to be specialists in crowd management, the members of the Gauteng and East Rand units said they were ‘stretched to such a limit that sometimes a platoon was left with five members for the day’. The following statements from other ACCU members indicate similar perceptions regarding the diminished crowd management capacity of the units:

’The demand from area level was high’

’Stations became dependent on the ACCUs’

’Obtaining crime statistics was more important for station commissioners’

’While crowd management was not neglected, logistically the units struggled’

’The shortage of members or vehicles could not be an excuse in terms of the Regulation of Gatherings Act. When a march was scheduled to take place, the police had to ensure that it took place.’

Impact on specialist crowd management skills

 

While the crowd management function of the ACCUs seemed to have been administered well despite the units’ dual function, the research sought to establish whether members were losing their specialist crowd management skills because of their other tasks. Specialist skills can be lost if training is not maintained, equipment is not upgraded, and if the members do not work together regularly.

 

Most Johannesburg and East Rand members agreed that their units had not lost their specialist skills. Almost all of the East Rand managers attributed this to the maintenance of in-service training. East Rand members and managers further stated that they had retained their skills because crowd management was (and had always been) a priority. Some Johannesburg ACCU members did, however, state that their unit had become deskilled because in-service training had not been done regularly.

 

Views on ACCUs’ impact on crime

 

Asked about their success rate in dealing with crime since the 2002 restructuring, the East Rand managers responded with very positive assessments: ‘East Rand was leading, especially over the weekends’. However the managers felt that they did not get credit for the successes. Some said that they were ‘number one’ in crime prevention in Gauteng. One manager stated that if they were deployed to an area for a long enough period then the successes were better, but this was not sustainable because they had other duties.

 

The Johannesburg managers similarly believed that their success could be measured by the decrease in crime in the area, but the impact of the  ACCUs on crime control was often not known. Ascribing credit was complicated, since the crime control operations were carried out  jointly with station level police members. This meant that the police  stations that took the credit because they had cells in which to lock up  those who had been arrested. The ACCUs did however keep records of arrests that their own members had made, and the head of the operational response services at the provincial office was aware of their successes.

 

Unfortunately, the successes of the ACCUs in crime combating could not   be measured against the crime statistics of the individual stations.    However the weekly operational statistics for the Johannesburg unit are available for the period 28 June to 10 October 2006 (Table 1).

 

 

While the statistics cannot prove the ‘success’ of the Johannesburg unit, they provide sufficient information to illustrate the extent of crime combating undertaken by the ACCU. Furthermore, the provincial head of operational response services confirmed that the ACCUs have been beneficial to the stations (Schutte 23 July 2007). Similar statistics for the East Rand ACCU were not available.

Conclusion

 

The decision to prioritise and increase the crime combating functions of the ACCUs could be said to have been beneficial, given the fact that there were more police to combat crime, and marches were showing a downward trend in the late 1990s. After 2002, however, protest marches and violent protest marches increased steadily with the result that ACCU members’ workload, in terms of both crime combating and crowd management, increased.

 

The effects of the change from Public Order Police units to ACCUs in 2001 was summed up well by one member, who said:

It was a name change only…people thought that the function had changed; the primary function did not change. It may have changed for the [policies] of the national department, but not for the ground members. The units became accountable to the area level, and stations would fight for ACCU members to increase their statistics.

From the interviews it appears that the crowd management function was not neglected in favour of crime combating and that it remained a priority for the units. ACCU members did not believe that they had become deskilled to the extent that they did not know how to perform their crowd management functions.

 

However it is clear that, given the increased incidence of crowd management events subsequent to the 2002 restructuring, crime combating would necessarily have been relegated to a secondary role.