Staff Reporter
South Africa urgently needs more specialised personnel if the country is to win the war against corruption, according to experts.
Head of the investigating directorate at the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), Advocate Hermione Cronje, told a webinar on corruption hosted by the University of the Free State (UFS) on Tuesday that those involved in corruption are becoming more sophisticated and difficult to trace.
She said it is therefore important for the country to determine the nature of specialisation required in order to properly address the kind of corruption that is starting to look like it is endemic in South Africa.
“We need specialisation in digital forensics,” said Cronje.
The webinar was titled “Corruption in South Africa: the endemic pandemic”.
“We have the advantage that, in the Zondo Commission, we have created a digital forensics capability that I believe is almost second to none. That capability now needs to be put at the disposal of law enforcement,” said Cronje.
She stressed that adequate resources, training and independence are critical to those investigating corruption.
Cronje said South Africa has not seen many big corruption prosecutions in a couple of years due to lack of capacity on the part of prosecution, hence the need for specialised training.
“We know it’s a slow and very frustrating process. The system has been very broken, and I think the steps we are taking to build and rebuild will bear fruit, but not in a spectacular way that we all hoped for,” she said.
“But let’s discuss the real issue, let’s discuss how to resource, how to make trials happen more speedily. Why not have a corruption court?”
Other panellists for the webinar included deputy national director of public prosecutions Advocate Ouma Rabaji-Rasethaba; Institute for Accountability in Southern Africa director Advocate Paul Hoffman; former judge of the Western Cape High Court, Justice Dennis Davis; and UFS dean of the faculty of law, Professor John Mubangizi.
UFS rector and vice-chancellor Professor Francis Petersen was the facilitator.
Rabaji-Rasethaba said the NPA has capacity and capability challenges in terms of fighting crime but was reorganising and rebuilding to ensure that it is on top of fighting corruption.
“The Anti-Corruption Task Team, which is the law enforcement agencies coming together to fight corruption, has also been hollowed out. But the good news there is that we are in the process of rebuilding it,” said Rabaji-Rasethaba.
She said they now have a module called the Fusion Centre and are currently working from the Financial Intelligence Centre in Centurion to make sure that the fighting of corruption is fast-tracked. This module was established when COVID-19 corruption started.
“We’ve now agreed that the NPA and the DPCI (the Hawks) need to co-locate with the Asset Forfeiture Unit (AFU) to the special investigating unit in DPCI, which is tracing assets, so that we can fast-track recovery of the proceeds of crime. We are also capacitating the NPA, particularly the specialised units such as the Specialised Commercial Crime Unit and the AFU, to make sure that we get all the right skills we need to be fit for purpose,” Rabaji-Rasethaba explained.
Mubangizi said even though South Africa has an adequate and sufficient legal framework to deal with corruption, the problem persists because corruption has become institutionalised, systemic and normalised.
“And when something becomes institutionalised, systemic, and normalised, it becomes endemic,” he said.
Mubangizi expressed concern that in some cases, the country’s political leadership is largely responsible for some of the corruption and that there is lack of political accountability.
“I think the law does not bite hard enough. It’s one thing to have the laws, but it’s a completely different thing to have it property and effectively enforced. This brings into question the role of law enforcement agencies,” he said.
“Unfortunately, most South Africans do not trust that these agencies are able to bring corrupt officials to book.
“Some of the members of these agencies are assumed corrupt themselves, and the agencies are perceived to be compromised, captured and toothless.”
Davis indicated that South Africa has enough institutions to fight corruption but questioned why there is no real moral authority in the country.
“We need to look to our political structures,” said the retired judge.
“The NPA should be strengthened and should also reach out to the expertise in the country, which can assist in this regard.
“I still believe that the best way of dealing with corruption is through the use of the South African Revenue Service to hold people accountable.
“If we can expedite these cases and actually find people guilty of tax fraud, we hold them to account and get back significant sums of money.”
Hoffman emphasised that the culture of impunity has gradually grown since the Scorpions were dissolved.
“There is a need for the creation of a Chapter Nine institution that answers to Parliament and is specialised, trained, independent, resourced with security of tenure, and compliant as the best way forward in the fight against corruption,” said Hoffman.
He said one of the main jobs of this Chapter Nine institution would be to address the recovery of the loot of state capture.
