Nathi Mthethwa – praag.org

Violence against women, children, elderly ‘prevalent’ in S. Africa: Mthethwa

The fight against crime could not be separated from the war on want, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa said on Thursday.

Speaking at Business Against Crime SA’s gala dinner in Sandton, the minister said contact crimes such as murder, rape and assault occurred in environments which did not allow for a decent social and family life.

“This speaks to the challenge of addressing the three resilient fault lines, which are unemployment, poverty and inequality,” Mthethwa said.

He said that with recent crimes against toddlers, teenagers, and the elderly, police had been blamed fairly and unfairly for not doing enough to protect citizens against such crimes.

“Various independent voices have expressed what should be done and we have listened and engaged them,” he said.

Mthethwa urged parents to work hand in hand with police in protecting their children, as it was their responsibility as much as it was the police’s to guarantee their well-being.

“Violence against women, children and the elderly is still prevalent in our society,” he said.

“This phenomenon militates against our national effort of creating a caring and humane society, underpinned by values of human solidarity, justice, peace and development.”

Measures were being taken and strengthened to stop crimes committed against women, children and the elderly.

Mthethwa called on business to play a more prominent role in the battle against such crimes.

“We want to urge you as the business sector to play a prominent role on such matters,” the minister said.

“We need to hear your voice because the majority of victims of such crimes are employees who contribute to our country’s economic growth.”

Another major challenge facing the safety and security cluster was lawlessness during public protests.

“The… negative impact is that the policing of public protests draws the police away from their normal policing activities and forces the police to redirect resources,” he said.

“This can lead to gaps in normal policing which are sharpened when the police personnel deployed to the policing of such events are drawn from local police stations.”

The business sector had also been affected by this problem.

“To demonstrate this strain around policing, since the start of this financial year the police have managed 6028 peaceful protests and 974 unrest incidents,” the minister said.

“A total of 1499 persons were apprehended during this period.”

Government appreciated the efforts undertaken by the business sector against crime because the sector could have adopted a stance of sitting on the sidelines.

Government had worked with Business Against Crime for over 17 years and a new memorandum of understanding between the two was being finalised, said Mthethwa. – Sapa

S. African crime stats present a bleak picture

A bleak picture emerged on Thursday from the latest figures on serious crime such as murder, burglary, aggravated robbery, and hijackings. In absolute terms, the number of murders have risen by 4%.

One expert described the 2012/13 crime statistics, released by Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa in Pretoria, as “the worst figures seen in 10 years”.

Mthethwa said the number of murders increased by 0.6 percent in the past financial year. However, it was down 16.6 percent over the past four years, and 27.2 percent over the past nine years.

There was also a 6.5 percent increase in attempted murder in the year under review. This was in contrast to the 16.8 percent decline over the past four years and the 51.7 percent decline over the past nine years.

The number of aggravated robberies increased by 1.2 percent over the past financial year, Mthethwa said.

However, there were still 29.7 percent fewer of these crimes than nine years ago and 18.7 percent less than four years ago.

Residential burglaries increased by 3.3 percent in the past financial year, and non-residential burglaries by 1.7 percent over the same period.

In the 2012/13 financial year:

— theft out of motor vehicles increased by 3.6 percent;

— commercial crimes increased by 0.6 percent;

— car hijacking increased by 5.4 percent;

— robbery at residential premises increased by 3.6 percent;

— truck hijacking increased by 14.9 percent;

— drug-related crime increased by 13.5 percent; and

— cases of drunk driving, or driving under the influence of drugs, increased by 1.5 percent.

Raw figures showed that the number of aggravated robberies increased from 101,203 in 2011/12 to 105,888 in the past financial year.

Following Mthethwa’s announcement, the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) said the increase in violent crime showed government’s approach to crime was not working.

“After a long period of decreases in serious and violent crime, these are the worst figures we have seen in 10 years,” ISS analyst Gareth Newham said.

“Violence remains unacceptably high and should be treated as a serious crisis which stands in the way of South Africa’s social and economic development.”

Newham said the ISS was concerned by the murder rate, since it declined over the last decade, only to rise again in the last financial year.

“It has grown by 650 cases. This is almost two additional murders per day on average. We need more data on why it has gone up,” he said in a telephonic conference.

He said most car and truck hijackings were linked to crime syndicates.

“This increase suggests weakness in crime intelligence.”

Newham said the increase in aggravated robbery indicated that police were not in control of the situation.

However, national police commissioner Riah Phiyega said crime in South Africa was under control.

“The story of [the SA Police Service] SAPS is a story of assurance and confidence. When I look at the crime situation over a period of nine years, you all see that there is a general decline,” she said.

“We expect this declining trend to continue in the majority of our serious crimes categories. There is no doubt in my mind that the crime situation is under control.”

Presenting the crime statistics, Mthethwa said shoplifting decreased by 3.9 percent over the same period.

There were also decreases in robberies at non-residential premises, by 0.6 percent, in cash-in-transit robberies, by 20.3 percent, and bank robberies, by 80 percent. – Sapa

18 years of crime – counting the dead

by Kevin King

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With the release of the latest crime stats imminent, I’d like to recap what’s happened in the last 18 years in South Africa.

Homicide

Firstly, it’s interesting to note that the SAPS and the media only report the murder rate but ignore the actual number of victims killed in homicides, the act of killing another human being illegally. There is a very thin line between murder and culpable homicide but fact is that death is the result.

In the 1994/1995 year, 38,525 homicides were reported by the SAPS. 25,965 murders and 12,560 culpable homicides. 105.55 killed per day.

In total, for the last 18 years including the 2011/2012 year, 597,500 were killed in homicides at a rate of 91 per day.

In the last reported statistics, the SAPS reported 27,397 homicides in the 2011/2012 year, a slight decrease from the previous year and a 29% decrease from the4 1994/1995 year.

The most unexpected discovery I made when analysing the stats was regarding the ratio of culpable homicides to total homicides. There is a clear, undeniabletrend in the last 18 years. From 33% in 1994/1995, the ratio increases consistently each year until 2011/2012 where it ends on 43%. There are three possible reasons for this:

There has been a steady change in the courts/law, every year, for the last 18 years, that has seen a greater percentage of homicides being classified as culpable homicide instead of murder, thus the law is being more lenient.
Criminals themselves have been changing their behaviour, every year, for the last 18 years, in a manner that has seen them committing more unintentional homicides.
Homicides are being incorrectly classified as culpable homicides in order to make the murder rate look rosier, because as mentioned, the murder rate is the main indicator of the crime situation in South Africa and the only figure that is reported, so there is motive to manipulate this figure.

Serious contact crimes

5,216,629 reported victims of serious contact crimes in the 18 years from 1994/1995 to 2011/2012. That comprises:

597,900 victims of homicide who are now dead
443,551 victims of attempted murder
4,175,178 victims of assault with intent to do grievous bodily harm

There is a thin line between category 2 and 3 but fact remains, there were 794 cases per day where someone’s life was in serious danger.

Sexual assault

Always a horrific stat, 1,111,425 reported cases of sexual offences took place in the 18 years from 1994/1995 to 2011/2012. As mentioned in my previous articles, cases of sexual assault are severely under-reported in South Africa. So here is a look at estimates of actual sexual assaults in the last 18 years based on the reported cases by the SAPS:

Conservative estimate (1 in 5 reported) – 5,557,125 (846 per day)
Moderate estimate (1 in 10 reported) – 11,114,250 (1,692 per day)
Aggressive estimate (1 in 20 reported) – 22,228,500 (3,383 per day)

Most surveys and experts indicate that between 1 in 10 and 1 in 20 cases of sexual assault are reported.

Arrests made, where do the criminals go?

According to NathiMthethwa, over 800,000 arrests were made in the 2012/2013 year for “serious crimes” and 352,513 of these were convicted, I’m however surprised that Nathi never expected anyone to do the maths…

Earlier this year our prison population stood at 156,000 and that was at 130% over capacity. So Nathi, where do these serious criminals go? 352,513 arrested and convicted in only ONE year but our prisons were over capacity before these convictions? Assuming all these serious criminals stay behind bars for 2 years, where will next year’s 350,000 serious criminals go? Because I promise you now, at the end of the 2013/2014 year there will not be more than 160,000 prisoners in jail, so how can there be 352,513 arrested, convicted and jailed for serious crimes, unless most of these never see a day behind bars? Taking your stats Nathi, there should be over 2 million criminals in jail for serious offences…

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South African police handled 12 000 protests

Police handled more than 12,000 public protests during the 2012/2013 financial year, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa said on Thursday.

“Over the past four years, a total of 46,180 incidents were attended to and all were successfully stabilised, with 14,843 arrests effected,” he said at the release of the 2012/2013 crime statistics in Pretoria.

These were made up of 41,104 peaceful and 5076 violent protests by the SA Municipal Workers Union, the SA Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers Union, protests in De Doorns in the Western Cape, Marikana in the North West, and Zamdela in the Free State.

“During 2012/13 alone, police managed 12,399 public incidents. Of these 10,517 were peaceful and 1882 were violent public protests with a total of 693 various criminal cases reported,” Mthethwa said.

“Most of the cases were reported in the Western Cape and North West provinces. Currently, stability has been restored.” – Sapa

South Africa’s robberies on the increase

The number of aggravated robberies increased by 1.2 percent over the past financial year, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa said on Thursday.

However, there were still 29.7 percent fewer of these crimes than nine years ago and 18.7 percent less than four years ago, Mthethwa said at the release of the 2012/13 crime statistics in Pretoria.

Residential burglaries increased by 3.3 percent in the past financial year, and non-residential burglaries by 1.7 percent.

He said common robbery decreased by 2.2 percent over the reporting period.

“The role of the community in supplying the necessary information and the patrols of the streets has drastically reduced possibilities of this crime,” he said.

“This is corroborated by swift arrests that have been affected.”

Mthethwa said shoplifting had decreased by 3.9 percent over the same period.

There were also decreases in robberies at non-residential premises, by 0.6 percent, in cash-in-transit robberies, by 20.3 percent, and bank robberies, by 80 percent.

In the 2012/2013 financial year:

— theft out of motor vehicles increased by 3.6 percent;

— commercial crimes increased by 0.6 percent;

— car hijacking increased by 5.4 percent;

— robbery at residential premises increased by 3.6 percent;

— truck hijacking increased by 14.9 percent;

— drug-related crime increased by 13.5 percent; and

— cases of drunk driving, or driving under the influence of drugs, increased by 1.5 percent.

Mthethwa said there was an 18 percent decrease in ATM bombings, from 261 cases in 2011/12 to 214 in 2012/13.

Arson decreased by 8.7 percent over the reporting period.

“Advancement in technology on individual dwellings, the improvement of the infrastructure to reduce informal housing, as well as electricity roll-outs have also assisted in reducing this crime,” Mthethwa said.

There was a 4.1 percent decrease in malicious damage to property and a 4.4 percent decrease in the theft of motor vehicles and motorcycles. – Sapa

South Africa’s murder rate increases

The number of murders in South Africa increased by 0.6 percent over the past financial year, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa said on Thursday.

Speaking at the release of the 2012/13 crime statistics in Pretoria, he said the murder rate had previously decreased by 16.6 percent over the past four years, and by 27.2 percent over the past nine years.

“Since 1994, we have been making steady progress in the fight against crime.

“We will work double hard to ensure this slight increase is re-routed to the downward trends that we experienced over the past nine years,” he said.

There was also a 6.5 percent increase in attempted murder in the financial year under review.

This was in contrast to the decrease in attempted murder by 16.8 percent over the past four years and 51.7 percent over the past nine years.

Mthethwa highlighted the causes for the increases by province.

These included cases of domestic violence and alcohol-related arguments near taverns in the Eastern Cape and labour unrest in the mining sector in the North West. – Sapa

Minister wants answers about Khanyi Dhlomo’s loan

Kanyi and Mark, the 'Afronaut' — Khanyi and Mark, the ‘Afronaut’

Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies has asked for a detailed report on how the National Empowerment Fund could have granted businesswoman Khanyi Dhlomo a R34-million loan.

Dhlomo, through Ndalo Luxury Venture, received the loan to establish a luxury fashion shop in Johannesburg.

The cash-strapped fund has defended its decision to fund Dhlomo’s Luminance luxury-brands store.

The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) has criticised the National Empowerment Fund’s (NEF) loan for luxury boutique Luminance, co-owned by Khanyi Dhlomo. The clothing store stocks brands that include, amongst others, Giorgio Armani, Tom Ford, Oscar de la Renta and Alexander McQueen

“It has come to the attention of Economic Freedom Fighters that the National Empowerment Fund has granted Khanyi Dhlomo R34-million to open an exclusive elite boutique of overpriced clothes in Hyde Park, Johannesburg,” said an EFF statement on Monday.

“The manner in which the R34-million was approved by the wife of Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa, who is the current [chief executive] of the NEF, is questionable.”

The fund’s CEO, Philisiwe Buthelezi-Mthethwa, praised Dhlomo for her entrepreneurial skills. She said it was “wonderful” that labels such as Oscar de la Renta would now be available in South Africa.

But it seems Davies is not convinced. He said he wanted to establish whether the transaction was in line with the public empowerment process.

“It is definitely our intention as a department that we want to see more public money which supports empowerment supporting actual people who are getting involved in the productive sector of the economy and also in local productivity.

“We are not particularly interested in businesses that are going to be importing luxury goods,” said Davies.

Moemise Motsepe, the fund’s spokesman, told Business Day on Monday that the retail sector was primarily white and foreign-owned but most consumers were black.

“With the Ndalo Luxury Venture transaction, the National Empowerment Fund is laying the building blocks of black participation in this sector.

“Though the fund has funded other black women entrepreneurs, the Ndalo transaction is the biggest by the fund in respect of black women entrepreneurs,” he said.

He said the investment was in line with the fund’s mandate and policies in that it supported a company owned and managed by black women in an untransformed sector.

Last week Dhlomo said her business had a broadly based shareholding. Ten percent of the company belongs to a staff trust and 10% is owned by rural women who will supply the shop.

Dhlomo is the founder of Ndalo Media, which publishes Destiny and Destiny Man magazines and Sawubona – SAA’s in-flight magazine. She is also CEO of Ndalo Luxury Ventures.

The empowerment fund is currently waiting for a cash injection from the state.

Khanyi’s father, Oscar, is a former Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) secretary-general, who is now a casino tycoon.

His daughter and Mark Shuttleworth shared a “special relationship” earlier.

The billionaire “Afronaut” Shuttleworth’s “warm and special relationship” with Dhlomo ended when she married the Nigerian Chinezi Chijioke. – timeslive.co.za/mg.co.za/citypress.co.za

Too many police employees with criminal records

An audit has revealed that 1448 police employees have committed crimes themselves, the police ministry said on Sunday.

“The audit established that 1448 members have criminal offences,” Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa said in a statement.

The audit into how many current employees of the SA Police Service (SAPS) have criminal records had been going on for two years, he said.

Mthethwa said that the next step would be for national police commissioner Riah Phiyega to decide what action should be taken.

“I have now instructed her and the management team that feedback on action should be provided to me by the end of October this year.” He said that going forward there would be a legal process “where everyone will be given an opportunity to state his or her side of the story”.

“That said, our resolve to root out any unwanted elements within the police will never be deterred by anything, no matter how long and what it takes.” Mthethwa said the audit had taken longer than expected because the ministry wanted to ensure it was thorough.

The audit had also revealed that there were “serious challenges” regarding the management of discipline in the department.

Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa and police commissioner Riah Phiyega should resign, the SA Policing Union (Sapu) said on Monday.

“[We] call on [them] to…do the honourable thing — resign from their positions,” the union’s leader Mpho Kwinika said in a statement.

“We have been calling for a judicial commission of inquiry into the SA Police Service simply because there is no leadership and management in the police.”

Sapu was reacting to the outcome of the audit released by the police ministry on Sunday. – Sapa

No suspects in SA Police hack attack

No suspects have been identified in connection with the hacking of the SA Police Service website last month, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa revealed on Wednesday.

Mthethwa said the investigation was still underway and the level of threat to identified whistleblowers was not yet known.

The information was provided in an answer to a parliamentary question by Freedom Front Plus spokesman Anton Alberts.

Alberts asked the minister whether any steps had been taken to safeguard those whose identities were compromised.

Mthethwa replied: “Full implementation of steps will be finalised after the investigation and the threat assessment is completed.”

Alberts said it was concerning that these people appeared to not receive any protection by police.

He feared the hacking incident would be a set-back for crime-fighting because people with information would be too scared to come forward.

“This is negligence on a huge scale and shows the incompetence of the state’s information technology agency which manages the police’s website. The public’s confidence in the police will definitely be harmed by this.”

In May, a State Information Technology Agency (Sita) official said information posted by citizens alerting police about crime had been left on the police site by mistake.

“The data is collected on that public server. There was a little bit of an oversight, because it should have been removed afterwards,” said divisional head responsible for government solutions, Daniel Mashao.

“We increased the functionality [of the police website] to allow people to be able to report further information. When we did that we should have also decided to move it to the secure site.”

The hacker reportedly performed a data dump when complainants and whistle-blowers’ details were downloaded from the SA Police Service website’s e-mail server and uploaded onto another site.

Mashao said at the time that the information obtained by the hacker comprised about 15,000 lines.

“Most of the information was submitted anonymously. We are concerned because there is information [within the 15,000 lines] where people have given [their] further details to say ‘I know about such and such [a crime].”

Mthethwa re-iterated in his reply that nobody in the witness protection programme had been compromised in any way, contrary to media reports.

The hackers used social networking site Twitter to inform the public that the attack was in connection with the lack of arrests for the August 2012 shooting of 34 protesting mineworkers at Marikana mine in Rustenburg.

Public Service Minister Lindiwe Sisulu also answered questions submitted by Alberts.

He had asked her what security measures were in place at the time.

Sisulu replied that the website had a firewall and network intrusion protection, malware inspection and antivirus software.

It also had an inverse proxy, which took requests from the internet and forwarded them to servers in an internal network.

“Those making requests connect to the proxy and may not be aware of the internal network, and it helps to protect the internal network from intrusions,” Sisulu said.

The website application was developed in 2004/05 and there were no external contractors involved in its maintenance.

Sisulu said the increasing sophistication of cyber-criminals had resulted in a race to implement security measures ahead of attacks.

She said Sita had scanned its websites for vulnerabilities and a process had been underway since February this year to address these vulnerabilities.

“This is unfortunately a tedious process as it requires the redevelopment of large portions of the application.” – Sapa

Why did the Gupta family use Waterkloof Air Force Base?

The Minister of Defence, Ms. Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, must provide answers as to why the Waterkloof Air Force Base was made available for the Gupta-family and whether they will be paying for the use of the airport and what costs it amounts to,” Mr. Pieter Groenewald, the Freedom Front Plus’ chief spokesperson on Defence says.

According to Mr. Groenewald, the excuse that the Lanseria airport was not suitable for the Guptas’ aircraft is unacceptable as the Mafikeng airport is closer to Sun City and is definitely suitable for large aircraft.

“It appears that the air force are bending over backwards to accommodate the Guptas who are well known for their financing of the ANC.

“When the air force and the police are abused for personal enrichment, then it promotes corruption and the abuse of tax payer’s money.

“The minister of Police, Mr. Nathi Mthethwa, must also explain why the police was used to escort the Guptas’ friends and whether the costs will be paid from the state coffers.

It is totally unacceptable that the ordinary public is disrupted during peak-hours and that the taxpayers’ money is used to make it as comfortable as possible for the Guptas’ guests to attend a wedding,” Mr. Groenewald said.

He said that the FF Plus will be asking questions in Parliament about this issue.

‘1202 police firearms missing’ – South African minister

A total of 1202 police firearms have gone missing since the beginning of last year, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa revealed on Wednesday.

Mthethwa said in a written Parliamentary response that 885 firearms were lost or stolen last year and 317 this year. Of those 170 had been recovered.

The Democratic Alliance said the large number of lost police firearms was fuelling an illicit trade in weapons.

“This means that the majority of these dangerous weapons are still out there on the street, most likely being used to commit crime,” said DA spokeswoman Dianne Kohler-Barnard.

“The reality is that the SAPS is fuelling the illegal firearms trade in this country.” – Sapa

Hawks tight-lipped on Malema arrest

The Hawks would not confirm a news report on Friday that a warrant had been issued for the arrest of expelled ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema.

“The Hawks don’t issue warrants, so we don’t comment on that,” said spokesman McIntosh Polela.

Asked if the unit was planning to arrest Malema, he said: “Even if we were planning to arrest him, we won’t tell you.”

Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa’s spokesman, Zweli Mnisi, referred queries to provincial police.

Gauteng police spokesman, Brigadier Neville Malila, said he knew nothing about an arrest warrant for Malema.

The City Press reported that the warrant was issued on Friday morning.

Malema was due to appear in a Pretoria or Polokwane court next week on charges of money laundering, corruption and fraud, it said.

The matter related to his Ratanang Family Trust and its shareholding in On-Point Engineering, a company that had allegedly made millions from Limpopo government tenders.

The publication said it was unclear whether Malema would be jailed before appearing in court. – Sapa

Clashes between Zuma and Malema supporters in Limpopo province

A scuffle broke out between police and ANC Youth League supporters outside a hall in Thohoyandou, Limpopo, on Tuesday ahead of an address by President Jacob Zuma.

The fight broke out after supporters of expelled youth league leader Julius Malema were chased out of a memorial lecture hall where Zuma was to speak.

About 300 of them were seen carrying banners, with the image of Malema, and singing: “Zuma is troubling us”.

Police arrested five people on the scene.

Some youth league supporters were apparently assaulted inside the venue by police and Zuma supporters.

Jacaranda FM’s news team tweeted that police fired teargas during the scuffle and that security was tight.

Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa condemned the incident and told SABC radio: “Those people should have known what kind of a leader Madiba was… very radical, very militant, but a very disciplined cadre of the movement and that’s how we grew through the echelons of the movement to be where he was as he left office.”

Police spokesman Brigadier Hangwani Mulaudzi and Presidency spokesman Mac Maharaj could not immediately be reached for comment. – Sapa