Justice Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi has warned that organised crime and syndicate activity pose a growing threat to the integrity of South Africa’s law-enforcement institutions.

Speaking at the University of Johannesburg’s Combating Corruption Summit last week, Kubayi punctuated an otherwise routine official exposition of South Africa’s crisis by asking: “What is it that we need to do to protect law enforcement from the corrosive effect of organised crime and syndicate activity? In other words, how do we preserve the integrity of the institutions in the justice system?”

She was alluding the claims and revelations coming out of the Madlanga Commission, which has highlighted the penetration of law enforcement bodies by criminals. Most recently, former deputy head of crime intelligence Major General Feroz Khan was dismissed from the police on grounds of corruption, defeating the ends of justice, and contravention of legislation, following repeated claims of links to illicit tobacco and precious metals syndicates and tender manipulation.

Kubayi said in her remarks that one of the commission’s revelations raised concerning questions about the extent to which law-enforcement agencies had allegedly been captured by organised crime. She said individuals at different levels of law enforcement were “working in cahoots with criminals to repurpose and weaken law enforcement agencies fighting against crime”.

Her remarks acknowledged the importance of stronger governance and functioning accountability systems to protect the institutional integrity of state institutions meant to combat crime. In particular, she said, criminal groups focused their efforts on senior police officials to give them maximum leverage. This was similar to the pattern at state-owned enterprises, where board members became engaged with corrupt activities before they took hold at lower levels.

“For the sake of our future and that of the future generations this capture cannot be allowed to succeed,” she declared.

The growing threat posed by organised crime and syndicate activity, Kubayi added, had also made the enhanced protection of whistleblowers imperative. Individuals who expose wrongdoing provide investigators with valuable information about hidden networks, illicit transactions, fraudulent activity, irregular tenders, and shell companies, potentially turning suspicions into evidence for formal investigations and criminal prosecutions. They nevertheless do this at significant risk to themselves.

Observers could, for example, hardly fail to miss the fact that in the high-profile case of murdered Gauteng Health Department official Babita Deokaran, a number of hitmen were convicted, though very little was done to identify and prosecute the more senior members of the conspiracy. This point was raised by other speakers at the summit.

Kubayi continued by saying that the draft Public Disclosures Bill would seek to strengthen the framework governing the protection of whistleblowers. The legislation would be intended to provide secure channels for reporting wrongdoing, protecting those who come forward from retaliation and occupational harm, and ensuring that disclosures are dealt with by appropriately capacitated institutions and officials.

The proposed measures include stronger confidentiality protections and access to witness-protection mechanisms where necessary. The Bill would also provide for the application of the Witness Protection Act of 1998 to disclosers and related persons, extending protection to people who provide information about wrongdoing, irrespective of the position held by the person allegedly responsible. It would also extend legal aid to disclosers who require it.

The minister’s comments, however, failed to address even higher-level corruption and the systems that have made corruption a pervasive problem across the country. This is that senior politicians have enjoyed a degree of immunity from consequences, and even from proper scrutiny. The penetration of organised crime extends into the political class. The Madlanga Commission, for example, began with claims that the former police minister, Senzo Mchunu, had himself been linked to organised crime. He has been suspended from his position, but remains on full pay, and his successor in Cabinet bears the qualified title “Acting Minister”.

Moreover, extensive political interference in the appointment and operation of the public service means that a willingness to act against corruption may be qualified by consideration of the political ramifications of such actions. The African National Congress has indicated it has no intention of enforcing the impartiality that an effective and profession public service requires.

Under these circumstances, the efforts of engaged civil society and business groups remain particularly important, at least until the state decides to commit properly and politically to an anti-corruption agenda.