Cop to appear in court on corruption charges
A 39-YEAR-OLD police officer attached to the Tactical Response Team (TRT) is expected to appear in the Bishop Lavis Magistrate’s Court today on charges of corruption.
The officer was arrested at the weekend on suspicion of forwarding information to people operating in the Western Cape underworld.
Hawks spokesperson Katlego Mogale said it was reported that the suspect was arrested during an intelligence-driven operation conducted by the National Task Team investigating gang-related activities, the National Intervention Unit, and the TRT.
“It’s alleged that the suspect had been enticed between 2019 and 2020, by an underworld figure, to infiltrate the Anti-Gang Unit and supply them with information relating to operations of the underworld figure in return for gratification,” said Mogale.
Mogale said the suspect, with three accomplices who included alleged underworld kingpin Nafiz Modack, was charged with corruption.
She said the four would appear in court today.
Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union spokesperson Richard Mamabolo said it was unfortunate that anybody who was entrusted with preventing crime might find themselves involved in acts that they had taken an oath to prevent.
Police Minister Bheki Cele said being a police officer was an onerous job, but warned officers to “keep your blue. If you don’t want to keep your blue, we won’t hesitate to convert it into orange (prison dress)”.
“The officer who allegedly opted to be greedy and worked with the underworld was not one of us,. That’s a truth in the sun. It was his choice, so he must live with his choice.”
Corruption Watch head of stakeholder relations and campaigns, Kavisha Pillay, said from the organisation’s perspective, corruption within the SAPS was rife.
Pillay said Corruption Watch had received close to 3 000 complaints a year from whistle-blowers among the public relating to corruption in the police force.
“It is definitely a problem in South Africa. It is definitely a problem that communities are experiencing, where for example in this case in particular, a police officer who was meant to be a law-enforcing officer and uphold the law, has allegedly put a price tag on our law,” Pillay said.
She said communities had lost respect for the police, and police management needed stronger accountability mechanisms within departments, and needed to “clean up their act quickly”.
The chairperson of the community safety standing committee in the Western Cape Legislature, Reagan Allen, said a recent reply to a parliamentary question indicated that 52% of police officers in the Western Cape had been found guilty of corruption since 2009.
Allen said at least 1 303 corruption investigations were undertaken, and 680 officers were found guilty. He said more than 300 officers were dismissed, while lesser sanctions were imposed against others.
“Though this means that more than half of the corruption cases among the police in the Western Cape were found guilty,” Allen said.
He commended the efforts to fight corruption but sought further clarity on the time frames for investigations to be concluded.