Daily Dispatch
Police – builders and wreckers
TODAY we were proud to report about excellence in policing. By doing what he was trained to do, and doing it with determined, meticulous persistence, Warrant Officer Mzukisi Tolosi of Kidd’s Beach police station has deservedly been showered with praise by the Director of Public Prosecutions Advocate LW Mahlati, SC.
Tolosi’s hard work resulted in the re-arrest and conviction of Sibusiso Butana who raped and strangled five-year-old Qhama Mnukwa.
Butana, armed with an axe, kidnapped the child who was playing with her friends at Good Hope village near Kidd’s Beach in December 2014.
Butana was arrested and charged but the case collapsed when essential evidence went missing.
Tolosi then took over and started investigating from scratch. Last month Butana was sentenced to two life sentences.
Tolosi is deserving of high praise, not only from his superiors and colleagues but from all of us too. His achievement is heartening for many reasons, not the least being the delivery of justice for the child’s bereaved family.
His commitment and professionalism also helps restore the damaged bridge of faith between the public and the police service. For citizens in a crime-blighted country such as ours, knowing that police officers of Tolosi’s calibre are protecting us, helps us all breathe a little easier and sleep a little better.
Tolosi’s success also underscores the importance of professionalism within the police service.
Nowhere is the contrast better demonstrated than by the social-worker-cum-bank-executive-cum-SOEfunctionary-cum-ANC-factional-apparatchik who was propelled to the lofty heights of national police commissioner.
In appointing Riah Phiyega in June 2012, President Jacob Zuma ignored a number of highly able career policemen and also disregarded warnings from the security sector about Phiyega’s complete lack of skills or insight into policing.
Within two months the nation was horrendously shocked by the deaths, mostly at the hands of the police, of 44 people at Marikana.
Appearing before the subsequent Farlam commission of inquiry, Phiyega withheld evidence and lied repeatedly in an effort to cover her tracks.
But no one was fooled. “No amount of obfuscation will shield her from the hard, cold facts, that reveal her role in the most shameful episodes of policing in post-apartheid South Africa,” said Gareth Newham, of the governance, crime and justice division of the Institute of Security Studies.
It was no surprise when the commission found that she lacked the integrity and leadership qualities necessary for her post. A board of inquiry then began to probe her fitness to hold office. It was no surprise either when it released its finding this weekend: indeed, she is not fit.
Marikana aside, Phiyega has wrecked rather than build the police service. Her politically motivated interference in appointments and the subsequent exit of capable senior career officers, has caused unnecessary tension and division among a staff that works under often life-threatening conditions. This in turn has had the effect of detracting attention from the primary responsibilities of policing, such as fighting crime.
Unfortunately rebuilding and strengthening the police service will take far more than the commendable efforts of individual professionals such as Tolosi who understand their task. It will take the president having an appreciation for this too.
Zuma of course, should be taking responsibility for appointing Phiyega in the first place, but don’t hold your breath.