Cape Town – Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (Hawks) boss Berning Ntlemeza on Wednesday said he would consider shifting more officers from the new specialised units dealing with illegal narcotics and firearm crimes to the Western Cape, the country's murder capital and drugs hotspot.
Ntlemeza was briefing Parliament's portfolio committee on police on the establishment of the National Bureau For Illegal Firearm Control And Priority Violent Crime [NBIFCPVC] and the South African Narcotics Enforcement Bureau (Saneb).
MPs questioned why the Western Cape had received a lesser staff compliment than some other provinces.
According a progress report presented to MPs, the Western Cape NBIFCPVC would have 14 officers, while 22 officers had been deployed to Gauteng. Nine officers have in the interim been placed at Saneb in the Western Cape, while the unit has 25 officers in Gauteng, 24 in KwaZulu-Natal, 14 in the Northern Cape and 10 in the North West.
The establishment of the units was first announced by President Jacob Zuma in his 2016 State of the Nation Address.
Ntlemeza said: "It took a long time to finalise the structure because the capacity on how to deal with it had to be seen, however, it has now finally been approved."
According to the Hawks, the NBIFCPVC will focus on, among others, forensic linkages, transnational crime syndicates, police killings and violent crimes.
SANEB officers will focus on identifying and swooping on transnational drug networks, drug dens, the manufacturing of drugs, human couriers and emerging threats.
According to the document, the interim Saneb have made 436 arrests, secured 28 convictions and uncovered 42 clandestine laboratories from March 2016 to January this year. The street value of drugs seized during this period was R116 million.
In the interim, the NBIFCPVC had arrested 231 people, convicted 22 of them and recovered 1,850 firearms.
"I would like to have more convictions in court, but the system has its own process," Ntlemeza added.