Compromised Disciplinary Process of IPID-implicated SAPS Officials Condemned

ActionSA notes with serious concern the response provided by the Acting Minister of Police to ActionSA’s parliamentary question, which confirms that two senior officials within the South African Police Service (SAPS) Protection and Security Services were found not guilty in internal disciplinary proceedings. This comes despite clear findings and recommendations by the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID) that they had a case to answer for serious misconduct.

The reply confirms that both officials remain in SAPS employment, and that while IPID had recommended disciplinary action following its investigation, the internal SAPS disciplinary process ultimately contradict the substance and intent of those findings, resulting in exoneration.

The IPID investigation identified serious misconduct, including contraventions of SAPS disciplinary regulations arising from conduct inconsistent with the duties and obligations of members within the Presidential Protection Service environment. These findings were sufficiently serious to warrant formal disciplinary proceedings, yet the internal process resulted in not guilty findings on all charges.

This outcome cannot be viewed in isolation. It adds to a growing body of evidence before the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry and Parliament’s Ad Hoc Committee into related matters, both of which have exposed deep and systemic vulnerabilities within SAPS governance and accountability structures.

These processes increasingly point to an uncomfortable but unavoidable conclusion: SAPS internal disciplinary mechanisms are not fit for purpose in their current form and cannot be relied upon to deliver credible accountability in politically sensitive or high stakes matters.

The pattern is now consistent: IPID makes findings, SAPS refers matters to internal disciplinary processes, and those processes routinely result in acquittals that are difficult to reconcile with the underlying investigative record. In light of these developments, ActionSA will be submitting an urgent formal PAIA application requesting the full record of decision and/or judgment arising from these disciplinary proceedings.

This will include the presiding officers’ detailed reasoning, evidentiary assessments, transcript records where available, and all submissions made by the parties during the disciplinary hearings. The public has a right to understand how such serious IPID findings are repeatedly overturned within internal SAPS processes.

ActionSA will continue to pursue parliamentary and legal avenues to ensure transparency, restore credibility to police oversight institutions, and ensure that no official is shielded from accountability through flawed internal processes.

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