Listen here.In their latest interview with Chris Steyn, Willem Els of the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) and Richard Chelin, an independent governance expert, share details of the war on drugs and crime in South Africa. Describing the struggle of dedicated detectives, Els reveals “for the past three months at one of the units they use a private vehicle and they rotate…and they are filling it up…just to do the job. You know, that's dedication - and that's the thin blue line that we are talking about; and those are the guys that actually make a difference in South Africa and stand between us and anarchy if you look at what's going on in the police.” On top of their lack of resources across the board, they are battling huge management challenges: “...they're running out of commissioners or generals to appoint as acting because of the arrests and so on….it is very demoralising if the one that you're looking up, if the one that is supposed to give you guidance, is actually exposed as a possible criminal. And who is guiding them then? You know, so those guys have got a real challenge. Their role models are being arrested. What now?”.Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. Register here.Support South Africa’s bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here..Edited transcript of the interview.Chris Steyn (00:01.06)South Africa is in the grip of a codeine addiction crisis. I speak to Willem Els of the Institute for Security Studies and Richard Chelin, an independent governance expert. Welcome to you both.Willem Els (00:17.272)Good afternoon, Chris.Richard Chelin (00:17.288)Thanks having us, Chris. It's a pleasure to be here.Chris Steyn (00:20.996)Thank you. You're welcome. Willem, we have heard that when Nigerian drug lords are put under surveillance, they are spotted with bottles of cough syrup in their hands. What is that all about?Willem Els (00:34.638)Exactly, Chris. We got feedback from our sources that that is something that actually occurs every day when they're keeping them under surveillance. So we had a look at Nigeria at why is it reflecting back on them or what is the case. So we saw that in recent years Nigeria suffered a severe challenge with codeine addiction and it became so abused that they actually declared a national emergency. And part of that emergency, they prohibited the manufacturing of any codeine within the boundaries of Nigeria, but also the importation of any codeine-based medication to Nigeria.Chris Steyn (01:25.07)So these Nigerian drug lords will not be able to swig from bottles of cough syrup back home.Willem Els (01:31.018)Yeah, they will have a problem there. But here with us, you know, it is not that much regulated, it is over-the-counter available. So that is maybe one of the reasons. Because it is so freely available that it's also becoming a problem now in South Africa.Chris Steyn (01:49.282)In terms of cough syrup, what have recent raids by law enforcement found?Willem Els (01:55.778)Well, what they found is when they do raids, there is also an element of codeine amongst the medication, the lesser material that they find, not only the codeine, but also your anti-histamine-based medication that is discovered or that is found whenever they hit on these places.Chris Steyn (02:17.092)Hm. And what quantities have they been confiscating, Willem, do you know?Willem Els (02:22.978)Now we don't know exact quantities, but with every raid we know that it is wholesale format quantities that they discover. It is not your one or two or three bottles or packets at a time.Chris Steyn (02:36.238)So how do highly scheduled or and regulated substances get into the hands of these criminals?Willem Els (02:43.97)Well, in the first place, you know, it is one of the things that they, or the methods that they use, is that they do pharmacy hopping. That means they go to the first pharmacy and they buy as many as they can, then they go to the second one, especially your independent pharmacies that are not linked. Like, for instance, if you go to your bigger chains, you know, they've got one system and they can see what was dispensed to you, et cetera. But if you're independent and you're smaller pharmacies, they are not connected in any way. So they can go to as many as they want and they can buy as many of these bottles as they want because it is not restricted.Chris Steyn (03:22.5)So there's no central database for all the pharmacies to use that can flag these people.Willem Els (03:28.33)No, not like… I mentioned with your bigger chains, of course they're all linked and they can see if you go for instance to the one and it's not your regular chemist that you use and it's from the same chain, they go online, they got your whole profile there and they can see what you got and also then they enter there what they are dispensing to you, whether it's antistamine or any other medication.Chris Steyn (03:57.038)Richard, are South Africa's laws and regulations not strict enough?Richard Chelin (04:02.536)Well, as we always say, whenever it comes to such, you know, any type of organised crime, the law is there, you know, the law is there, it's a matter of enforcing it, right? And very often you will find that is sometimes a lack of understanding among law enforcement officials themselves onto how do we apply these laws. You know, the regulation will be there. We have the South African Health Product Regulatory Authority, SAPRA, right? They've got all these policies, strategies…they're reworking one currently, but at the end of the day, we can have all the beautiful laws, all the wonderful, you know, system strategies in place, but it all goes down to how do we actually enforce them. I think that's that's the key challenge that we currently face.Chris Steyn (04:48.473)Willem, you are in regular contact with detectives who fight drug smuggling. What resources do they have available to aid them or are they struggling?Willem Els (05:01.31)I think that's a very good question. You know, across the board with your police agencies or your police units, we seem to have quite a severe shortage, not only in manpower, but also in resources. That is from your computers and the other resources that they need to do with the investigations, but also it comes down to transportation. You can't have one unit that's got access to one or two vehicles and you've got 10 or 15 people working at that unit. It just doesn't make sense. So what we will need to do if we want to fix this, and I know that the ministry is doing a good job, they're to reset, they're busy with the reset strategy and so on, but what we need to see is that we need a more sort of evidence-based dispensing of your resources in order to capacitate these type of units, like for instance your Drug Enforcement unit at the at The Hawks or with the police. You know, those guys, they are working really hard, but they do not have the resources that they need in order to fulfill their duties.Chris Steyn (06:13.001)We have heard of detectives putting in their own fuel, paying for it out of their own pockets.Willem Els (06:20.798)Exactly, for the past three months at one of the units they use a private vehicle and they rotate and they are filling it up and just to do the job. You know, that's dedication and that's the thin blue line that we are talking about and those are the guys that actually make a difference in South Africa and stand between us and anarchy if you look at what's going on in the police.Chris Steyn (06:44.493)I mean we often hear South Africa is losing the war on drugs, but then you have these few dedicated officers doing everything they can, battling against the odds.Willem Els (06:57.77)Exactly. And you know, it's not only in the drug units, it's everywhere where you see those guys. And we know that they are demoralised. They've got a lot of challenges with management. You know, they're running out of commissioners or generals to appoint as acting because of the arrests and so on. So that's a challenge for them because it is very demoralising if the one that you're looking up, if the one that is supposed to give you guidance is actually exposed as to be a possible criminal. And who is guiding them then? You know, so those guys have got a real challenge. Their role models are being arrested. What now? So...you know, we're not going to turn the ship around in a few months, but at least we're in the right direction and we believe that with the new strategies coming up, the turnaround strategy that they're working on is going to make a difference where those people that are there because it's a calling, those people that are there because they care, that we can take care of them and take the road forward with them because at the end of the day, like I said, they are still our salvation in this crime ridden…Chris Steyn (08:10.097)Have you noticed an uptick in inspiration since the appointment of General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi to head Organised Crime on a national basis?Willem Els (08:21.726)You know what we noticed? You've got, like I said, who are making a difference. There are lots of bad apples in the police and that's why we are where we are. But those guys, you find some of them that are laying low, they waiting for the outcome. There's sort of a cautious optimism that you see with them. But unfortunately, you also see those, if you speak to them and you ask them, how are you? He says, well, I've got two years and five months left, or I've got seven months left. Looking forward to retirement because they don't see a future. So unfortunately that is the morale that is currently there but I think with the right move from a political level…also when they start with a reset of the police service, the changes will start to happen and we might be able to retain these guys and also walk the road with them in order to restore what it's supposed to be.Chris Steyn (09:19.481)Of course, those detectives, especially in the drug squads, have to be of very strong moral fibre, not to be tempted by the bribes offered by the big drug cartels.Willem Els (09:30.222)Exactly, you know, and that's one of the challenges that you have with the police. You know, if you are at a border post or a port of entry with all the obscene amounts of money that is going around with your syndicates, whether it's drugs or whether it's vehicles or whether it is gold, you know, the police officers become the target because they become the enablers and the protectors of these organised crime syndicates without their protection and without them…your organised crime syndicates, they have a challenge because they won't be able to operate in the way they do. So they are targeting these police officers and not only police, your customs and your immigration, all those people that are enablers of these syndicates. So yes, they are targeted… but they are also those who are standing up and then we have some good arrests. So it's an ongoing game. But I think when the morale is better and there's a good future for these guys. We're going to see some more arrests.Chris Steyn (10:40.535)Richard, from your side, what recommendations would you like to see implemented urgently?Richard Chelin (10:48.402)Sure. I think we touched on it earlier now, it's a central digital tracking, like a mandatory centralised digital tracking system. I think SAPRA already has an ID link digital tracking database, but I think it just needs to be expanded across all public and private pharmacies. That will completely kill what Willem described as the pharmacy-hopping loop. I think that's one of it and and that's like one of the immediate recommendations.And the other ones would be, you know, a harmonized SADEC cross border enforcement. Basically what I mean is as much as we're seeing a lot of seizures of, you know of those codeines in South Africa, very often a massive higher quantity are being exported across the region. And I think one of the aims is to create an unified regional rapid response team. You know, you have like we've done on other forms of organised crime between SAPS, Interpol, Customs.And and sharing, real time sharing of intelligence, not only sharing intelligence when you really need it, but a constant flow of intelligence sharing, real time seizure data, and the various different, you know, type of cough mixtures that are that are coming out, that are being seized, so that you can track what is being sent in the market, what are the new products coming in and what is the impact of that.And the other one I think is quite interesting is as well when we talk of physical seizures, we talk of pharmacies that people can go to. But another aspect that's quite less known is buying medicine off the Internet, right? We've seen the internet boom they call it, in terms of unregulated medicines. You can go to Facebook Marketplace, you can go to WhatsApp groups and you order it and then it's delivered at your in your post box the next day, right? Or delivered at your house. And then that's something that also needs to be, you know, also tracked and impacted upon. And lastly, I would say legal penalties, more aggressive legal penalties. I think we need to look at the legislation, revise it, looking at you know, penalisation on importing and distributing counterfeit pharmaceuticals that should carry severe mandatory prison servant sentences, which reflect not only the risk of this, but also…Richard Chelin (13:14.238)…the risk to human life that these pharmaceuticals bring at most times.Chris Steyn (13:20.867)Willem, we've spoken about this, but because it's so cheap, well, relatively cheap, school children are increasingly using it to get high.Willem Els (13:30.958)Yeah, of unfortunately so. We spoke to some pharmacists and they indicated that there are an upsurge in young children that are buying it. And the one actually explained to us that, you know, some of your cough syrups can be sold for as little as R20. So that is a challenge. And when we also spoke to some people in the field, they said yes, and those children then go back to school and some of them are selling it for R90. So they're already starting at a very early age where they are abusing this and where it is a very good trip that they can go on. You know, it is something that they perceive not to be as dangerous because it's over the counter and everybody is doing it. We haven't seen people dying from it, etc, etc. And that is one of the reasons it's becoming more and more popular even from a very young age.Chris Steyn (14:27.747)Willem, from your side, is there anything else you'd like to add in terms of urgent intervention?Willem Els (14:33.198)Yeah, I think, you know, what we should really look at is an awareness campaign because I think this is something that is going very much under not too much scrutiny. It is not in the open. It is something that happens. There's a lot of silence about it. But I think what we will do in our research, we're going to publish, we're going to have awareness on that. We're also, we're going to look at the parents of these children in order to see how they can actually prohibit and look at the warning signs when this abuse is taking place and so on. So that is from my perspective. I think one of the important things because you know they start with the soft drugs and then what happens after this? What if codeine or a bottle of coughing syrup doesn't satisfy you anymore? What drug are you going to use then? And that is a problem.Chris Steyn (15:28.961)Indeed. Thank you. That was Willem Els of Institute for Security Studies and Richard Chelin, independent governance expert. Speaking to BizNews, I'm Chris Steyn. Thank you both.Richard Chelin (15:40.68)Thank you very much, Chris.Willem Els (15:40.802)Thank you, Chris.