The union representing the majority of South Africa's police called on Thursday for a review of the laws against dagga and sex work.
In resolutions approved on the final day of its national congress in Cape Town, the Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (Popcru) declared that both areas should be "regulated".
One delegate even urged that if sex work was legalised it should be turned into a public-private partnership rather than be left to the vagaries of free enterprise.
The resolutions, both proposed by Popcru's Gauteng region, follow a suggestion earlier this year by National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi that prostitution be legalised for the 2010 soccer world cup.
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The resolution on dagga noted that use of the drug was regulated in other parts of the world, such as Holland's Amsterdam.
It called for research on "the prospective aspects of dagga regulations" and on the drug's medical effects, and committed the union to work towards steps "to counter the stigma".
The union will also "pursue discussions with authorities on dagga regulations".
One delegate, Durban police officer Christopher Mkhize, told the congress that dagga had been around in South Africa long before white settlers arrived and decided it was wrong.
"We can't stay with that in a democratic country," he said. "It is our democracy and we are the ones who should say what is wrong and what is right."
He said he himself would not have achieved his current qualifications if it were not for the money raised by his family's cultivation of dagga in rural KwaZulu-Natal.
"Most of our kids have been taught through money generated by dagga," he said.
The resolution on sex work - described in the original motion as "prostitution" but changed after objection from a female delegate - called for "street transactions" to be made illegal, which they already are, and for a working environment which complied with labour legislation.
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