Ian Cameron: The leadership collapse in SA’s broken police force…

In his latest interview with BizNews, Ian Cameron, the Chairperson of Parliament's Portfolio Committee on Police and the Democratic Alliance’s Police Spokesperson, talks to Chris Steyn about the Madlanga Commission and Parliament Ad Hoc Committee hearings and some of the key players, including former Police Minister Senzo Mchunu and suspended Deputy National Commissioner Shadrack Sibiya. As for tenderpreneurs like Cat Matlala and Hangwani Maumela, Cameron states: “The only way for organised crimes and these types of persons or entities to flourish is when the State is involved at a very senior level… It worries me that some people implicated are still in their positions or mentioned or continuing to work.” Cameron also details the horror findings on his recent oversight visit to Nelson Mandela Bay where the Flying Squad only has one vehicle, a single cab bakkie with over 300,000 kilometers. As for irregular expenditure of over R650 million in SAPS in the past financial year, Cameron says it “points to a much more deeply rooted corruption-and-fraud network that has been built in supply chain management and procurement”. He charges that “all of these things” add up to a picture of “leadership collapse- and urges: “…if we don't replace a large number of the so-called leaders, nothing can change on the ground”..Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. 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..Watch here.Listen here.Edited transcript of the interview.Chris Steyn (00:01.441)Testimony at the Madlanga Commission and Parliament's Ad Hoc Committee has kept the nation riveted for weeks, but many things have been happening on the sidelines. We get a catch up from Ian Cameron, Parliament's Portfolio Committee on Police, the chairperson, and the spokesperson for the Democratic Alliance on Police. Welcome, Ian.Ian Cameron (00:27.864)Thank you, Chris. Yeah, you know, it's so important that we realise there are many things that are ongoing. So while we see all of this play out and, you know, with a lot of excitement, people follow the proceedings of the Madlanga Commission, of the Ad Hoc Committee. It's very important that the lived reality of ordinary South Africans remains the priority and the focus. And while those processes need to take their course and they need to do what they need to do, we need to make sure that on ground level, we do what we need to do with regards to the police and obviously ordinary South Africans.Chris Steyn (01:08.813)Well, you went on an oversight visit to Nelson Mandela Bay where you made some horror findings on the ground. Ian, share those with us.Ian Cameron (01:18.988)Yeah, sure, the Nelson Mandela Bay visit was really discouraging in terms of just the general decline, municipal decline. First of all, it stands out. It's horrific to see how quickly things went. Just basically went to the dogs in Nelson Mandela Bay. But with regards to the police, it really was a bittersweet visit because we spent a lot of time with a lot of police members and it was so encouraging once again and I've shared this with you before you know from many of the units it's always so encouraging to see how they keep going, they make ends meet, they make plans to still function properly which is obviously to me it's motivating, it's inspirational but at the same time and I’ve…I've opened a whole list of notes that I want to talk through with you. So we started with the Anti-Gang Unit and visiting the Anti-Gang Unit. And really competent leadership, in my opinion, ground level leadership. I think that given the right resources, they would absolutely make a deadly blow to or deliver a deadly blow to gangs in Nelson Mandela Bay and the rest of the province because they're a provincial or they have to cover the entire Eastern Cape, which is obviously a big challenge because gangs are generally starting to move to smaller, traditionally smaller, non-violent towns as well. So it was interesting to look at them. When we visited them, they had less than half of their vehicles available to actually work, less than 50% of their vehicles are operational. And the large majority of their vehicles have got 200,000 300,000 kilometers plus on the clock. And they're really suffering. They've got members that are part of the Anti-Gang Unit that were never trained to be part of the Anti-Gang unit, as we see in Cape Town as well. And SAPS can try and tell otherwise. The fact of the matter is the members tell…Ian Cameron (03:40.438)…me, us directly that they haven't been trained to be there. And many of them join the Anti-Gang Unit with the vision of becoming a specialised operator in the police. Maybe the Anti-Gang Unit would be a stepping stone as a specialised capacity to later on move to another like TRT or even later on go for a Special Task Force course. Obviously, should they go through the the relevant process before.The entire Anti-Gang Unit for the Nelson Mandela Bay region, actually the province, only get six million rand a year. Now, if you go and compare that, and I'll speak about SAPS generally later when we go through that, but if you go look at irregular expenditure of the police in one year, in the last financial year, it accounted to over 650 million rand in one year.But a little unit like this that's meant to turn the tide and literally save lives, where daily violence and specifically murder occurs, they don't have the capacity to do so. They just simply don't have the budget. So yeah, that was the Anti-Gang Unit.Chris Steyn (05:02.061)Flying Squad.Ian Cameron (05:08.632)So I think maybe as an intro to Flying Squad, touching on more of the Anti-Gang Unit, just as context how it links to Flying Squad is when you look at these units, they usually are responsible for stabilising a region or they're used for that.But an Anti-Gang Unit is really a unit that is intelligence-led. So anything they do should be based on intelligence. They're not a visible policing function to just patrol streets. They are meant to target kingpins. They're meant to do raids. They get information. They process it. It becomes intelligence. They should have informers. They should have a direct link with Crime Intelligence. And I can tell you that not only in Nelson Mandela Bay, but even other parts of the country, and especially in Cape Town, the majority of the Anti-Gang units usually fight blind. They do have successes here and there, but if they don't pay their own informers, they usually don't have intelligence to build on. And in this case, it's exactly the same. So now we move to Flying Squad, which is actually your rapid response capacity. Remember Flying Squad should be the capacity that reacts to any priority crimes or priority one types of offenses, armed robbery, business robbery, any kind of contact crime or priority crime or serious crime that is busy happening. They are the first point of call. So when you call 1111, what's meant to happen is that Flying Squad or Highway Patrol, depending on the region, are usually contacted first for rapid response. Obviously the relevant station would also be informed, but the whole idea is that they plug the holes to be able to always have available response to those areas. Now you won't believe me, but when we got there, Flying Squad in Nelson Mandela Bay only has one vehicle. It's a single cab bakkie with over 300,000 kilometers on…Ian Cameron (07:18.978)This is the same Flying Squad that just a few years ago deployed between 15 and 20 vehicles per shift. They now have one vehicle for every shift. It's so bad that the members at Flying Squad in Nelson Mandela Bay actually book off or take leave when they get to work and there are no vehicles. The ones that can't take leave either go and sit in a charge office at a station or they ask K9 unit whether they have space for them on a shift to go and support K9 unit when they work. So it basically means there is no real rapid response in the Nelson Mandela Bay region. This in a place that has got abalone poaching, for example, that's turning increasingly violent and getting worse almost, I would say, daily. You know, we visited areas where they count up to 150 abalone poachers diving at any given time together in one place, poaching, middle of the day. And I'm not saying that's just Flying Squad's responsibility. It certainly isn't just theirs. They might have a small role to play. The point is just that that goes hand in hand with organised crime, it goes hand in hand with gang violence, the drug trade, et cetera, and yet you don't have adequate response capacity. So during the oversight, I walked to go and check their statistics. They had only processed three incidents for the entire past weekend, three, for an entire unit.It gets worse. They currently have 56 operational members with one single cab bakkie to operate with. So it basically means that on a shift, they usually only have nine, more or less, nine members per shift. Now, how do you work with nine members with one single cab bakkie? You don't. I mean, it's impossible.Ian Cameron (09:35.65)They've got no high performance vehicle available at the moment. They got one of their BMWs back last week. It worked for one shift and then it broke again. Something wrong with the vehicle. Over 300,000 kilometers on it as well. Remember that some of those members are part of the Accident Response Team and they themselves also don't have the resources that they need. So in other words, the community has grown. I mean, obviously it's a natural process…But this capacity has just completely decreased. They've got no support vehicles. So the support team of Flying Squad don't have any vehicles to use. They need to use their own personal vehicles. And at the moment, they only have the one vehicle for response, and they've got two vehicles for the Accident Response Team.A lot of people say to me that, you you're saying all this publicly, it's exposing them. I'm like, listen, the criminals already know this; they are doing whatever they like, when they like already, trust me, they already know this. And the cops, you can imagine how demoralising it is when you work in a specialised unit like this and you see the way that it's going. And you compare this to a Flying Squad in Cape Town, for example, which certainly has a lot of challenges. But boy, boy, not on this level. I have never ever seen it as bad as this. So for all practical purposes, I mean, the cops there don't even call themselves Flying Squad. They call themselves Dying Squad, literally. They call themselves Dying Squad. And that is what it's become.Chris Steyn (11:19.949)Is there any chance of emergency intervention there?Ian Cameron (11:25.004)While I'm hoping that this oversight would do that. I mean, an interview like this with you is absolutely critical. We'll continue with oversight. I mean, from a DA point of view and I guess from a Portfolio Committee point of view, we do as many, I mean, you and I have spoken about many, many, many oversight visits. If we're not sitting in a committee or like the Ad Hoc Committee or whatever, we do oversight. That's our job. The frustration with it is that, you know, it's only been a year in the position, so we're not...not in a place yet to really put a lot of pressure in terms of budget. But now we're actually heading towards that, where we will have to start saying, but wait a minute, all of this money was given, what did you actually do with it? I mean, a police service that it's got 650 million rands of irregular expenditure, that's a significant chunk of money. And we'll have to start holding them accountable with that. We'll have to start literally not signing off on certain things, in my opinion at least, because they shouldn't get any additional money. I’m honestly of the opinion and even more so after visits like these, that the police don't have a shortage of money or financial resources. They don't manage what they get properly. They are poor custodians of the tax money that they get. are poor custodians of the money that the public.. gives them. Can I tell you about the K9 Unit?Chris Steyn (12:59.585)Please, I don't know if I should say please, but do go ahead.Ian Cameron (13:03.31)I don't want us to go for group counseling afterwards. So we went to the K9 Unit in Nelson Mandela Bay. So I'm going to send you a picture that you can share with the viewers of a dog there that I met, Diesel, that I really want to keep, I can't. But he unfortunately failed his medical.Chris Steyn (13:24.501)I saw, I saw your photo.Ian Cameron (13:27.234)Yeah, so he failed his medical and there's a chance of having minor arthritis in his one leg, possibly in the future, so they say. So they couldn't pass him, but the most lovely dog. But anyway, I told the members that I'm actually there for the dogs, not them, tongue-in-cheek. And it's always encouraging to be with K9 Unit members because they are some of the most resilient police members, in my opinion, working under extremely strenuous circumstances and I think their value is underestimated. You must remember that in the majority of cases units like Flying Squad for example or K9 they don't get any scarce skills allowance. But let me give you an example. Say for example, Special Task Force is chasing someone and they're chasing very dangerous suspects in the bush, they are behind the K9 Unit member. That K9 Unit member doesn't get a quarter of the pay that those Special Task Force members get. He doesn't get any form of scarce skills allowance or danger pay for that matter, but he's the one walking in front with his dog or with her dog; that while Special Task Force - bless their souls - get 21,000 rand additional scarce skills allowance just so that they don't leave to the private sector or to, unfortunately, tongue-in-cheek, Cat Matlala. Those are more military guys though.But it's just, yeah. In terms of the K9 Unit, yeah, it was bad to also see. Let's start with their vehicles. They didn't have any rapid response capacity. So they only have single cab bakkies. You know what I don't get? It seems to me like some person sitting at head office clearly has never even touched a dog, is making decisions on behalf of a unit he or she knows nothing about. Because how on earth do they think a canine unit that, similar to Flying Squad, needs to respond to high-risk situations, often have to chase suspects that end up fleeing in bushes and veldt and streets too. Now you need to chase them with a single cab bakkie….Ian Cameron (15:47.342)…that simply is not a high-performance vehicle where they actually need things like Golf GTIs or BMWs etc that they can use to get the job done. Now if we looked at them they had four vehicles boarded just in the past year, none of the four were replaced. There were members there that have been part of the K9 unit for many many years but they still haven't been granted an opportunity to go for training because there are no courses available. I spoke to one member, I said to him, how long have you been at K9. He says, no, I think eight or nine years. So I said to him, great, when did you go on your course? No, I'm still waiting. I said to him, what? He says, yeah, I've been waiting eight years since joining, eight or nine years, and I haven't been on a course yet. And I just thought to myself, what a waste. There are some of the members that have even bought their own dogs that they donate themselves then to the police; they've trained them, fully fully trained….I mean, they've been in K9 for decades. They can train dogs, yet the Roodevaal Training Academy won't sign off and give them a working certificate, despite the fact that it would just be a two-week kind of analysis that they would need to go through. And then that dog can be, can be used to work and make a difference. So for the entire Nelson Mandela Bay, the entire region, they only have two narcotics dogs. Now, this huge problem with narcotics and gangs, obviously you need narcotics dogs, similar to Cape Town that only has one narcotics dog. I think there's one coming back from training soon, luckily. And that was also due to our intervention. Nicholas Gotsell was the one that fought a hell of a fight to just get them to go to training. Again, a lot of people said, why are we saying all of this? Because the criminals would know. The criminals know already and we need to help these police members be able to do their jobs. At the moment, K9 puts out no more than one or two dogs per shift. A total of probably 13, around 13, 14 dogs at the moment.Ian Cameron (18:11.606)They used to put out, similar to Flying Squad, between 15 and 20 vehicles per shift. That was 15, 20 years ago. Now they struggle to get four members on a shift. And remember that that would equate likely to two vehicles. So that doesn't include your specialised dogs. Remember you've got dogs that, for example, work on protected species, things like abalone dogs or...what do they call them? Biological dogs that specifically do the scent of body fluids, etc. So, yeah, it really, breaks my heart to see something that way that shouldn't be that way, especially when you've got dedicated police members. This is a management crisis. It shows a collapse of management. And this is why earlier I said about Madlanga Commission as well as the Ad Hoc Committee, while all of this drama unfolds, the normal people on the ground are suffering, the normal cops are suffering. And I mean, we need to salute them for hanging in there. But it simply isn't fair to expect them to keep going at the rate at which they are while incompetent and often corrupt people are put in positions that they know nothing about.Before you ask questions if you have questions, the Roodeplaat Training Academy, for weeks on end now, we've had a running battle to make sure that the members get quality food. We literally, a few weeks ago, had to arrange for donations of water for the dogs because the dogs were sick. These types of things. If they can't do that, I think it was last week, they didn't sign off on the procurement of certain kinds of food. So for a few days, some of the members had to eat samp. Nothing wrong with samp. The point is just if you're someone on a course and you are literally working day in, day out, you need a healthy meal to support that. So all of these things add up to a picture of leadership collapse. So I honestly think that…Ian Cameron (20:33.314)…that’s where the major crisis is, is that if we don't replace a large amount of the so-called leaders, nothing can change on the ground.Chris Steyn (20:41.229)Now, I know you sit on the Ad Hoc Committee, so I don't know how much you want to say or can say about testimony led thus far before the Ad Hoc Committee and the Madlanga Commission. But what is your take?Ian Cameron (20:56.686)So I think, yeah, I think the Ado... Let me start with Madlanga maybe. I think the Madlanga Commission so far has brought a lot of extremely sensitive things to the fore, which is great. I think it's so important that, you know, everything is exposed and so on and so forth. The only criticism that I really have at the moment is that we've got the testimony again, I think today of Lieutenant General Mbotho from the DPCI, someone that is a very questionable character himself, someone that allegedly have interfered in Interpol Red List arrests before when he was still based in the Western Cape, a close associate of certain known underworld figures, some of them are currently in custody. And despite that, he was promoted last year. You know, we from the Portfolio Committee side, put in a lot of effort to try and ensure that the promotion doesn't happen. And the then leader of the Hawks, General Lebeya, defended it. And he said, no, this is the right thing. This is the same Lieutenant General at that stage, well, before he became a Lieutenant General, who also sent pornography to his whole Family and Child Protection unit when he was still based in the Western Cape. So lots of question marks there.And I think that's one part that could be bad for the credibility of Madlanga that we shouldn't necessarily accept that as credible because he is not beyond reproach. And I'll probably get a letter again for saying it again because I received lawyers' letters last round from others. But yeah, it's not beyond reproach. That's the only criticism I've had so far. Look, s commission is only as good as its consequences. So one would need to see what really comes out of it. It worries me that some people implicated are still in their positions or mentioned or continuing to work. In terms of the Ad Hoc Commitee, Chris, sure, it's been challenging in terms of time management. We've had really marathon sessions. We've had many, many, many sittings that lasted for up to 14, 15 hours…Ian Cameron (23:18.638)…where we sit, you know, till after midnight. Nothing wrong with working hard. In fact, that's what we pay to do. We're public servants, so we need to do that properly. But I do sometimes wonder if it's necessarily constructive, but that's a personal opinion. We've had witnesses before the committee that really were grilled in terms of questions, and I believe a lot was exposed. If we look at the way...that the National Commissioner was questioned, the Deputy National Commissioner, the suspended one, Sibiya. Sibiya himself was extremely exposed during that. He was contradicting himself. It really was not a good day for him, two days possibly. And the same with Senzo Mchunu, the suspended minister. So it wasn't great for them.There are some of the witnesses that I wonder whether they are relevant, but that decision doesn't lie with me. I think acting minister for Feroz Cachailia testified very, very well. He is, in my opinion, the most knowledgeable Police Minister that we've ever had in the last 20 years that I can think of. He is very, very well clued up in terms of the criminal justice system. He understands the fight against corruption. The one thing that bothered me of his testimony was when I asked him what does he think about taking on some of the previous wrongdoers that are still in the police? Typically the fact that Richard Mdluli’s sons are still part of the South African Police Service, you know, people associated with …, there are lists of names of people that should be investigated. And he said, he doesn't want to really look at the past. You know, he wants to look forward and people shouldn't be looking over their shoulder, et cetera. And I understand on the one side, he wants a positive working environment. You don't want people to be paranoid, but at the same time, you can't have a clean...Ian Cameron (25:37.099)….police service with integrity with those types of characters hanging around. It just doesn't work. So they can defend it all they like. Those people need to be removed from SAPS. If there's any indication of corruption, they should be removed. So, yeah, we'll have to see. I'm not convinced by the idea that they want to go and visit Cat Matlala in prison. I think it unnecessarily elevates his profile. He's not a superstar, he's a criminal, he should be treated as such. And also everything is sub judice. So what value is there in speaking with him? So sometimes I am scared that things will just simply be used for politicking and to get some air time. But again, that's my personal opinion. And we'll have to see how the rest of the process unfolds. I just know that this morning eight people were shot in Langa. They're shooting at the moment in Beacon Valley and Mitchell's Plain. So all of this continues, the violence continues while these processes unfold. And again, these processes are important, but we must make sure that we don't lose touch of what the lived reality on the ground is.Chris Steyn (26:57.303)Now one of the most often asked questions on social media is why the Tembisa Hospital looting kingpin, Hungwani Maumela has not yet been arrested despite his assets being confiscated.Ian Cameron (27:13.454)Yeah, isn't that interesting? So the question was also asked to the NDPP, Shamila Batohi. And she explained well that in terms of getting the result of Asset Forfeiture or the fact that the SIU seized what they did versus being criminally convicted, that the onus is different. And I understand that. But it's incredible to me that the SIU moved at the speed at which they did and there’s just…it feels to me like there's very little from the prosecuting authority…I don't serve on that committee, but it is very very frustrating to see the extremely slow speed. Well, just the slow pace rather because there is no speed at which things progress.Someone like that, I mean if if for example, if you look at the Shadow State the book by Jeff Wicks and you go through that, you look at Mafia state. There are several different books you can look at. Someone like that is literally a Mafia kingpin. The fact that journalists were able to piece together so much of the evidence and write what they have written. How can it be that entities like the IDAC/MPA/SAPS, the DPCI, have not been able to act?And it tells us one thing, it tells us that it's proper, proper organised crime. It's the reason why we rank so high. If you look at studies by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime, we are one of the highest ranking organised crime countries in the world because of this. The only way for organised crimes and these types of persons or entities to flourish is when the State is involved in a very senior level. and specifically your law enforcement authority. So, it just points to me that there is still significant political influence. Batohi said yesterday that she has never experienced direct political instruction. Maybe not directly, but they cannot for one moment tell me that there is no political interference in terms of prosecution, et cetera. In terms of IDAC's investigations, for example, and we'll have to see what the outcome of the committee and the Madlanga Commission is, but…Ian Cameron (29:38.987)…if you look at the claim with in terms of the arrests of Crime Intelligence members, et cetera, and that case must do what it needs to do, why not the same with something like the Tembisa Hospital? Because that surely then would also equate to a form of State Capture if they say that this forms part of it. Those are, again, my personal thoughts. We would need to see what comes out of this. I think it is important that we give a fair chance for the results of the different inquiries, commissions, committees, etc. But hopefully we will see physical results.Chris Steyn (30:17.421)Meanwhile, much is being made of the fact that he is a relative of, by previous marriage, of President Cyril RamaphosaIan Cameron (30:27.374)Yeah, that's quite awkward. That it was denied at the beginning. And then later on, it's like not-sure. It's kind of like Mchunu with being an associate or a comrade and his definition of immediately not being immediate. it is, I mean, in Afrikaans, Dit spreek boekdele. IIt is very, very clear that there are many associations that are far… better developed than what they would like to admit. I've got no doubt that a lot, especially with the ANC, that a lot of their political campaigns, campaigning, big events, et cetera, have been or are being sponsored by a lot of these characters. We saw about the 8th of January, allegedly some of the money came from Cat Matlala and more.You know, the irony of it is, I don't know if you picked up on it during the Ad Hoc Committee, but in terms of the 8th of January, the entire senior management of SAPS attended the function as well in the Western Cape earlier this year. And the question asked in the Ad Hoc Committee was that, why do you attend that, but you don't do the same for other parties? And they said, no, but it was for operational purposes. …I think things are going to get more challenging regarding the material findings of the Auditor General. We can touch on that now as well. …We can go through the list. There's no way that they can motivate that. That tells me that political interference still plays a massive role.Chris Steyn (32:41.805)The former Police Minister on special leave. What is his exact position now? Has he stepped back from ANC duties or not? Because there seems to be some toing and froing between him and the African National Congress.Ian Cameron (33:00.34)Yeah, so it's very interesting. According to me, he has now been relieved of party duties. It's going to be interesting to see if he survives as minister. My feeling is that he won't survive. Well, I'd be very surprised. I don't know how you come back from this, but we would have to see. In terms of his aspirations to become president, I think they are gone. But with the ANC, you never know; you never even know, things can change overnight. So we'll have to see what happens. Remember also, if you really go into depth, I touched on the Auditor General earlier, I said about the 650 million rands of irregular expenditure. The previous, I think, five years, there's over 2.3 billion rand that have still not been recovered of previous irregular expenditure. So...and part of the 650 million irregular expenditure over the past financial year includes the Medicaid 24 contract of Cat Matlala. So why I mention this is that these individuals gained access to the police and had direct contact with people like Lieutenant General Sibiya, the Deputy National Commissioner. And he can try and dance all he likes. The fact that he has breakfast…And just happens in the middle of Camps Bay of all places, police can't afford to stay in hotels in Camps Bay. I don't get that. I certainly can't. So anyway, but then he just happens to bump into Brown Mogotsi at breakfast. And they just happen to talk about all of this. And they just happen to bump into each other year and there again.It sounds off, especially for someone that has his own close protection detail, et cetera. You don't just haphazardly bump into people. And it's the same with Cat Matlala. If you listen to the stories how he was freely walking around in SAPS offices, how he had direct access to Sibiya, clearly had access to former Minister Bheki Cele…Ian Cameron (35:14.663)…and Mchunua denies it but I just don't see how all of this slips through the cracks, not even mentioning the Head of Supply Chain Management in the police that was implicated by the SIU in massive massive, massive corruption regarding PPE that was bought during COVID-19 for the police when he was still with Treasury and despite that he was appointed as the Head of Supply Chain in the police. so I know Chris there's still a lot that we need to talkChris Steyn (35:46.445)Well, we have had some good news, at least in the case of the Blue Light Mafia of Deputy President Paul Mashatile.Ian Cameron (35:55.415)Yeah, and I must thank you. You played a huge role, yourself and BizNews, to also highlight that throughout. But I think the media and civil society is responsible for holding them to account the way that they have, because what a fight it has been. Because there were quite a few times where all of us thought, OK, well, it seems that we're coming to an end. And the pressure just keeps going. And even Paul Mashatile himself, when I questioned him about it in Parliament, he kind of laughed it off. It wasn't, he didn't take it seriously. And look now, trial continues. It hasn't been struck from the role. The video is admissible as evidence. And it also indicates, just remember, SAPS found in their so-called disciplinary process that the that the video evidence was inadmissible, which is definitely not true. So, you know, it's interesting that they would choose one thing while a court of law chooses something else.Chris Steyn (37:09.781)All the credit goes to you for this one, Ian. Nothing would have happened if it were not for you. I think you were the first to, I remember interviewing you the day that the video went viral. Now your committee has adopted the Budget and Review Recommendation reports. What do you want to highlight from that? What has it exposed?Ian Cameron (37:34.511)Jeez, like it. We can spend an entire day on what has been exposed through that. I've touched on the irregular expenditure, but I want to spend a few more moments on that. The irregular expenditure issue really points to a much more deeply rooted corruption and fraud network that has been built in supply chain management and procurement of the police. When we questioned them, when they presented to Parliament a few, when was it? Just last week. Yeah, was last, I think last week, Monday, if I'm not mistaken. I can't remember exactly, but last week we sat with them and we worked through this. It was astounding to see and to hear the level of mismanagement occurring through the procurement process. And was interesting that the Head of Supply Chain that I spoke of earlier actually admitted that sometimes the people on the bid committees are not competent. And I was like, why do you choose them then? And he said, no, but they haven't been trained. And he is the jockey for that. He makes that decision. So there's no excuse coming back from that.When we questioned them about Cat Matlala, for example, and this is both in the Ad Hoc and in the Police Committee, it was clear to me that due diligence is not really part of the process on the level that it should be. Or if it is, it is ignored. So what can we highlight from it? Forensic backlogs, DNA backlog, all of that is a severe, severe delay in justice with regards to crimes of gender-based violence and many, others. The total instability in Crime Intelligence and the Central Firearms Register. And this is important and you and I should actually talk about it at some stage, but the potential changes or what we've heard or seen leaked so far of this ridiculous amendment of the Firearm Control Act…Ian Cameron (39:49.583)…is very, very worrying. And if we then see in the Auditor General report that the Central Firearms Register is not stable, then it kind of begs the question, but why do you want to disarm lawfully armed citizens while you can't even run a basic system like that properly? Infrastructure and leasing inefficiencies that drain the operational budget, there are stations where massive amounts of money is paid to rent building that just don't make sense. And if we then move to a place like Crime Intelligence, for example, where properties are allegedly rented that belong to certain police members at inflated rates, and there are many, many examples of that. Something positive was that that IPID, the Independent Police Investigative Directorate, got a clean audit again and that there is an improved turnaround time on investigation. Their big problem is that they really have a massive backlog of cases and that they've just been totally under-resourced for many, many years. And one must wonder whether that was not deliberate. Then I think the big frustration that was highlighted by NPA during the feedback that they gave was that they themselves have had heir doubts about SAPS actually implementing the recommendations that IPID makes. Many times they actually complain that they make recommendations, but then SAPS comes back and says they'll do their own investigation. So then you kind of start asking yourself, but what's the use of IPID if they just ignored? And then in terms of the Civilian Secretariat of Police that many people don't always even know who or what they are, also clean audit, much better performance. Things are… things seem to be stabilising. They do have a problem still with the staff turnover, but the management structure seems to be stable. So a lot of work again to do. We've made scores of recommendations and they will have about six months before they need to come and provide progress reports to Parliament on the improvement or not.Chris Steyn (42:11.905)Ian, what are your outstanding priorities?Ian Cameron (42:16.505)So Chris, have quite a few things. There are lists of things regarding some of the training academies. Philippi is still a problematic one. I just want to stay clear of any bricks when I go there again. And yeah, so there are things that we need to follow up on there. We've actually set up a list to the Minister of Police. I think it was sent this week, early this week, Monday or yesterday, with an entire list of things that need to be followed up. The fact that, for example, the Diving Unit is not a primary service, but the band is. Now, no disrespect to the musicians in the police, but they literally get paid to be musicians in the police. But the actual divers that need to go and remove bodies from sewage drains and dams, are not a primary service. The majority of them are on detached duty from other units. So just lots of things that don't make sense there. So we're busy with that. There's actually a joint oversight process coming next week in the Free State province, where we'll likely touch on that. But that's part of other committee work. But the Police Committee will play a very small role in terms of police response to issues around mining.Yeah, and then just questions regarding task teams, who are all the task teams at the moment in the country? Where are they? What budgets do they get? Who approved it? And so on and so forth. And yeah, so there are many things we should actually, we can spend a day on the list. I think that the Ad Hoc Committee and the Madlanga Commission are likely taking the majority of the space left of the year in terms of what is seen publicly, but we've got quite a bit of oversight that we need to follow up on. Something that I can tell you that we feel strongly about that's ahead of us is as a party to very strongly oppose the Firearms Bill amendment. It's absolutely nonsensical. It just makes no sense whatsoever. So we can still speak on that at some stage.Ian Cameron (44:40.398)And then the other thing is to actually look at a full type of Parliamentary inquiry or even a commission of inquiry regarding gang violence. I think it's very important that we can indicate what has happened since the Kayelitha Commission in 2014. Because in my opinion, very little or nothing was actually implemented that came from that commission. We've now given government over 10 years, 11 years since then, and still the situation is becoming worse. So we need to go back to that. So that is also something that we'll be zooming in on.Chris Steyn (45:22.655)As we are heading towards the end of the year, and I'm sure you desperately need a rest, Ian, how would you sum up the state of the South African Police Force today?Ian Cameron (45:35.054)Chris, it is significantly broken. The South African Police Service is, in my opinion, it's an unstable organisation. It is not one that has, it certainly doesn't have high morale amongst ground level members. But that being said, it still has some of the most dedicated public servants that I have yet to meet. I've never seen so many people that are so dedicated despite the circumstances. So I do think there is always light at the end of the tunnel. I certainly do have hope, but it is going to be very, very hard work in the future. And we need to keep doing what we're doing. In fact, we should be putting it on steroids, supercharged. We need to do, we actually need to do more. We keep on saying that your change will come. It's gonna take a long time. I’m guilty of saying that often. I personally just feel we don't always have that time. But that being said, if everyone does their bit, I'm sure we can move forward. I don't think everyone in SAPS is bad. And certainly, you know, I keep criticising the management of SAPS. Everyone in SAPS management is certainly also not bad. But there's a huge integrity problem amongst many of the senior members. And if we don't address the integrity crisis, none of the rest will.Chris Steyn (47:06.016)Thank you. That was Ian Cameron, Parliament's Portfolio Committee on Police's Chairperson and the Democratic Alliance's Spokesperson on Police, speaking to BizNews, I'm Chris Steyn. Thank you, Ian.Ian Cameron (47:21.081)Thanks, Chris.

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