Pretoria - There is a big need to get rid of corrupt Tshwane Metro Police Department officials as faith in them dwindles amid increased allegations of bribery solicitation.
This is according to MMC for Community Safety Karen Meyer, who said the increased loss of trust in the officials was worrying.
The department made headlines for the wrong reasons last year. In one incident, a teacher was manhandled by officers when she did not stop as she felt unsafe to stop where they flagged her down.
In other instances, officers didn’t wear their name tags and there were claims of soliciting bribes. This led to social media users complaining about run-ins with the officers in the metro.
Meyer said while corruption and bribery were an issue, a lot of people were ignorant as to who stopped them.
“A lot of times I get private messages from people with complaints. When we follow up it is sometimes the province or JMPD.”
She said they put out posts to warn people to look out for the name tags of officers, as well as the number of the side of the vehicle they are using.
Officers at the launch of a satellite police station of the Tshwane Metro Police Department in Pretoria's Hatfield precinct on Monday
Meyer said all motorists needed to do was to remember that number as they have tracking devices in the vehicles and they can investigate where the car was and who was using that vehicle.
The problem was that people would first want to lodge a complaint but after their statements and details such as address and identity number are taken by an investigative unit and the officer(s) give their side as well, people would withdraw their complaints.
“Three quarters of the time the complainant withdraws because of harassment and intimidation and are scared and that is a serious problem.
“At the end of the day we cannot do anything against the officer.”
Meyer said to combat this they had requested the city manager to investigate the possibility of centralising a disciplinary committee from the city manager’s office at the legal department.
“We want the committee to have no connection to the officers at all, so there is no influence and they get off lightly, not just in the TMPD, but other departments too.”
Another initiative to improve the capacity of the TMPD to deal with bribery in its ranks is the inception of an integrity unit.
The unit would target problem areas for example, the prospect of having a name tag embroidered on the TMPD to avoid officers removing the tag to avoid identification.
“I am not happy with the current way consequence management is dealt with and believe we must take control of disciplinary committees from departments. What we are doing now is not effective.”
She said officers were sitting with disciplinary cases all day while there were experts to deal with this.
In a bid to avoid motorists being victims on the road when dealing with officers she said they were in talks with Justice Project South Africa to see how they could implement the blue light protocol in Tshwane.
She said they had sent letters to the provincial commissioner on the matter to see if cannot be implemented across the board with the SAPS as well. This would permit motorists to to flash their hazard warning lights and stop where it’s safe.