As South Africa grapples with rising violence and eroding trust in law enforcement, the writer calls for the police service to emerge from a legacy of failure to fulfil its constitutional mandate.
When President Nelson Mandela signed the South African Police Service Act into law in October 1995, South Africa formally replaced oppressive apartheid-era policing structures with the South African Police Service (SAPS) – an institution expected to protect communities, investigate crime fairly, uphold rights under the new Constitution, and defend human dignity rather than subjugate the South African people.
General George Fivaz became the first National Commissioner of this reimagined institution, appointed by a president who understood the cost of giving power to those sworn to protect when that power is used to harm. Their generation did not fight for the police, but fought against them. The act of building something new, something accountable and constitutionally bound, was a declaration of what kind of country South Africa was to become.
I have thought about that moment often in recent months while watching certain events unfold inside the SAPS and asking whether the criminal justice cluster (CJC) we have today bears any resemblance to the one Mandela helped create.
