Killings spark concern about EC police brutality
Mthatha precinct under spotlight after data reveals large number of deaths
Since the late 1990s a total of 110 people have been killed by police in the Mthatha precinct, heightening fears about an internal culture of police brutality, especially in the Eastern Cape.
Alarm bells are being rung by civil rights groups about the acceleration of the trend since lockdown.
Three people were shot in their homes by police in former Transkei last week, including a 76-year-old Methodist lay preacher.
All the latest incidents were reported to the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid), which is sitting with more than 500 cases of police brutality since lockdown started.
This week Daneel Knoetze, the editor of police brutality investigative project Viewfinder, told the Dispatch that data mined from Ipid revealed that 110 people had been killed by police in the Mthatha precinct since these statistics started being collected in the late 90s.
Amnesty International SA spokesperson Mienke Steytler said most of the cases were not investigated, which was a denial of justice for the victims. She said the internal culture of violence had to be broken and police and political leaders held to account.
Knoetze said Viewfinder analysed case data for criminal complaints against the police in the Eastern Cape.
“This data, originating from within Ipid, showed the Mthatha police precinct accounted for some of the highest numbers of police killings and deaths in police custody cases in the country. Cumulatively, these ‘death’ cases emanating from Mthatha have tallied at more than 110 since record-keeping began in the late 1990s.
“While Dutywa and Qumbu’s figures were substantially lower, these are more rural precincts and it does not mean that the culture of abuse is necessarily more restrained in these areas.”
Knoetze said police killings happened with astonishing frequency in SA. But a handful of hotspots like Mthatha accounted for an overwhelming proportion of these cases.
“Experts have recommended that Ipid amend its case management systems to focus on the worst offenders within the police,” he said.
“With the recent appointment of a new executive director at the police watchdog, it may be a good time for these recommendations to be heeded so as to make a greater effect on police conduct and accountability.”
The latest fatal shootings occurred in Dutywa, Qumbu and Mthatha on Monday, Wednesday and Friday last week.
Ipid was investigating, said spokesperson Ndileka Cola
Police say in each case they retaliated after being attacked first.
Grieving families of those shot by police want answers, while human rights organisations are deeply concerned that officers have adopted a shoot first, ask questions later approach. The families have accused police of preventing them from seeing their loved ones before they died in hospital, and are asking provincial police commissioner Lt-Gen Liziwe Ntshinga, safety & liaison MEC Weziwe Tikana-Gxothiwe, Bhisho and police minister Bheki Cele to account for why police, wearing balaclavas, were deployed to kill these people in their own homes.
Relatives have accused the police of being trigger-happy and callous.
Knoetze said: “Police killings are justified within the organisation both because of the violent environment that cops work in, so they get desensitised and cynical, and because of a prevailing attitude that criminals are fair game.
“Though the definition of criminal becomes blurry and there is inevitable creep towards more and more serious cases of torture and execution. KZN is by far the worst, but the Eastern Cape is bad, too.”
Scathing criticism has also come from Corruption Watch, which said: “All of these heartbreaking accounts illustrate the systemic injustice that black people are subjected to from an institution that operates in a similar fashion to that of the apartheid and colonial era.
“Alarm bells are ringing, warning that many police officers continue to act as if they are both the law and above the law. If we want a police force that truly protects us, and that will face consequences for arbitrary or unlawful behaviour, then we need reform.
“We need an institution of policing that rejects its pre-1994 inheritance, and that truly subscribes to constitutional values. We need a police force founded within a human rights framework, upholding respect for people’s rights as well as the law. And we need a police force demonstrably committed to being corruption-free.”