Community Safety
- How many of the Khayelitsha Commission’s recommendations were fully implemented at the latest specified date for which information is available, and (b) what are the relevant details of each?
(a) None of the 20 recommendations could be fully implemented.
(b) The Commission of Inquiry into allegations of police inefficiency and a breakdown in relations between the police and the community in Khayelitsha made 20 recommendations. Ten of these recommendations are for the exclusive attention of the SAPS at National, Provincial and Local level, and they have not fully reported on the extent to which these recommendations have been responded to and implemented. DOCS is unable to report on the implementation of those recommendations and attention is drawn to the response received from the SAPS at the end of this reply.
Several of the remaining recommendations require the formal cooperation between the Civilian Secretariat for Police, the Department of Community Safety, the SAPS as well as other stakeholders. On 28 October 2014, the Department presented the SAPS with a draft Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to govern their relationship in the implementation of the recommendations. The SAPS did not respond to the MOU, and did not sign it, and thus DOCS was unable to establish the formal basis for a cooperative relationship.
In August 2015, the Premier of the Western Cape reached an agreement with the National Commissioner, General Phiyega, to establish a task team with representatives of SAPS and DOCS to implement the recommendations. Despite the lack of a formal partnership, the Department has been fully engaged in taking forward the recommendations and in this regard, DOCS together with the SAPS Cluster Commander, Maj Gen Brand, co-chair the Khayelitsha Joints Forum.
The South African Police Services informed me as follows:
(a) - ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________(b) A Task Team consisting of five (5) SAPS members and five (5) senior representatives from Western Cape Government was established to further discuss the recommendations as stipulated in the Khayelitsha Commission of Inquiry’s recommendations. The purpose of such engagements being to ensure that the implementers have a common understanding of the recommendations
