Question NW2281 to the Minister of Police
10 October 2017 - NW2281
Rawula, Mr T to ask the Minister of Police
What is the total number of criminal offences that (a) security companies and (b) officials and/or employees have been (i) charged with and/or (ii) convicted of in the 2015-16 financial year?
Reply:
PSiRA is involved in a number of operations with different stakeholders, including the SAPS. These operations are initiated by PSiRA or at times, the SAPS. The focus of these operations is on compliance in terms of the PSIR Act which includes the deployment of registered and trained security officers, illegal immigrants and compliance with the Firearms Control Act. During the 2016/2017 financial year, 26 PSiRA/SAPS operations were held that resulted in the arrest of 390 security officers. Of these 390 security officers, 387 were arrested for not being legally registered with PSiRA.
In addition to PSiRA inspections and investigations conducted, certain areas of non-compliance by the private security industry also warrant criminal prosecution and this forms part of the PSiRA’s enforcement strategy.
Investigations are conducted to detect unregistered security service providers as well as other criminal contraventions of the Act for the purposes of opening criminal cases against them with the South African Police Service.
During the 2016/2017 financial year, a total of 855 criminal cases were opened by inspectors of the Authority compared to 686 cases during the 2015/2016 financial year.
As at 31 March 2017, a total of 2 243 criminal cases were pending with the South African Police Services countrywide against security service providers where PSiRA opened the cases for contraventions of the PSiR Act and regulations.