The 2012 South African Budget Reveals Big Shifts in Police Personnel Trends
Does hiring more police officers result in less crime? Or does more crime result in more police officers? After years of mass recruitment, the South African 2012 budget reveals a shift from quantity to quality when it comes to police personnel.
Gareth Newham and Lizette
Lancaster, Head: Crime and
Justice &
Manager: Crime and Justice
Hub, ISS Pretoria
Does hiring more
police officers result in less crime? Or does more crime result in more police
officers? The reasoning behind the first statement has guided South African policy
makers for the past decade. The consequence of our policy choice has been the
second. With falling crime rates following years of mass police recruitment,
the government is likely to believe that its approach has been successful. While
policing can have an impact on some crimes, international experiences of mass police
recruitment have typically resulted in unintended yet significant outcomes. To
meet ambitious personnel targets, police management are more likely than not to
lower recruitment, vetting and training standards. Moreover, police command and
control systems take strain as front line managers are required to supervise
larger number of inexperienced and inadequately trained officials. Common
consequences include increasing levels of police misconduct, corruption and
brutality. With the South African Minister of Police currently facing over R 11
billion in civil claims, the policy of mass recruitment has proven to be a
costly policy choice in more ways than one.
With crime
starting to increase substantially in 1998, a fearful South African public
increasingly started to complain about weaknesses in the police service. A
common complaint at the time was that police were not visible or did not come
when called. By the change of the century it was therefore a logical policy option
to hire more police officials given that public funds were available. The thinking was that increased police
visibility would deter criminals and reduce crime levels. Police budget allocations therefore increased
significantly, at more than 12% per year on average for over a decade. A vast
bulk of the budget, 85%, was allocated towards paying the salaries of the
growing numbers of recruits. By 2011, the South African Police Service (SAPS)
consisted of 197 930 personnel. This represented a 50% growth of police
personnel since 2002/03, an increase of 65 620 posts. South Africa now has
police officer to population ratio of 1:323, well under the UN recommendation
of 1:400.
On the face of it, the mass recruitment
policy worked. Following total crime levels peaking in 2002/03, they have
dropped by 24% in 2010/11. However, a closer look at the crime figures suggests
that the issue is more complex than it first appears. In fact, it is not clear
to what extent, if any, increases in police personnel have contributed to
reductions in crime. For example, murder in South Africa has more than halved
since 1994, falling from 66.9 murders per 100 000 people to 31.9 per 100 000 in
2011. This is the only crime category to have shown such a consistent downward trend.
A trend that has no correlation with police personnel figures. In 1994, the new
SAPS consisted of 140 000 personnel, with at least 40 000 recruits coming from
the police forces of the apartheid created “bantustans.” At that time the SAPS wage
bill was unaffordable and a decision was taken to place a moratorium on further
police recruitment. Over the next three years or so, SAPS personnel numbers
fell to around 120 000. Interestingly, murder
declined by 10% in this period despite 20 000 fewer police personnel being on
duty.
Although the police will argue that
murders are a consequence of local social dynamics and there is little they can
do to affect murder rates, crimes attributed to ‘professional criminals’ or
repeat offenders such as robberies are very susceptible to good policing. By
carefully gathering evidence at crime scenes and establishing intelligence
networks, police can identify arrest and jail the perpetrators of these crimes those
that support them. However, in the five-year period between 2004/05 and
2009/2010, during which time an already large police personnel contingent grew
by a further 30%, residential and business robberies increased by 51% and 295%.
It was clear that increasing police personnel figures was having no positive
impact on these and other crimes. Total crime rates also increased by 4%
between 2007/08 and 2009/2010, largely driven up by property related and commercial
crimes, despite ongoing police personnel increases.
At the same time the police were frequently
in the media for the wrong reasons. Reports
of police brutality, corruption and misconduct were almost a daily feature in
the news. In 2010, National Police Commissioner General Bheki Cele conceded to
an increasingly frustrated Parliament Portfolio Committee on Police that the
problem was, “We have not been big on quality, we have been big on quantity.
People have been thrown in by chasing quantity rather than quality.” While it
may have been easy to blame the “troops”, the real reason for the predicament
was weak leadership and poor management. Those tasked with leading the police
had not thought through the consequences and had not strengthened recruitment
and management systems. Fortunately, the
2010/2011 SAPS Annual Report sought to re-orientate the focus of police
leadership by emphasising that “improvement of the SAPS resource capacity is
dependent on the professionalism, discipline, and integrity of every member of
the SAPS”.
The 2012 budget vote document of the SAPS
has signalled a further policy about-turn in relation to personnel figures. For
the past few years the SAPS stated that by 2014/15 they were aiming to achieve
a target of 204 000 personnel. However, the 2011/2012 budget vote document released by the National
Treasury last week reveals that there is now a planned reduction in SAPS
personnel to 188 490.
Interestingly, in addition to reducing
total police personnel numbers, big shifts are planned for where these
personnel will be deployed and the type of police work they will do. Currently,
56% of all personnel work in Visible Policing division (undertaking patrols,
roadblocks and other high visibility operations, etc.) and 19% work in the
Detective Services division (investigating crime, gathering forensic evidence,
etc.) However this functional profile of the SAPS is the process of changing
substantially.
Over the five year period starting in
2008/09 and ending in 2014/15, the number of detectives in the SAPS is set to
increase by 24% to 38 152 personnel. This reflects the realisation amongst
policy makers that simply having large number of visible police officials does
not automatically reduce crime or improve service delivery. Rather, any deterrence
factor that the police may have is by increasing the risk to criminals that
they will be identified, convicted and sent to prison.
The police budget is expected to grow a further 6.6%
on average in the medium term until 2014/2015. This is in line with the current
inflation rate and therefore means that there will no longer enjoy real
increases in their budget for the foreseeable future. The SAPS will therefore
need to become more efficient rather than rely on spending more money to
achieve their objectives. Current plans
reflect a focus on building more police stations, improving the detective
services, strengthening forensic capacity, and improved overall skills and
working conditions. However, the key challenge will be to strengthen police management
capacity and internal accountability systems of the SAPS. If this is achieved,
South Africans can look towards better policing in the future. If not then we
will continue to experience problems with police brutality and corruption but
committed by better-trained and knowledgeable police officers.
