Criminal case against Health Professions Council

"What do you want? What is this? Who are you" the police colonel aggressively asked me.

South Africans justifiably have a low opinion and expectations of the country's public service and employees – health, education, police, NPA ... They're mediocre, corrupt, incompetent and negligent.

Public sector employees are very well paid, a third or more than their private sector peers for similar jobs having received above-inflation increases since 1994. The sector is overstaffed, around 2.7 million people, with many unqualified for their posts. Too many people earn too much but quality of service remains poor. That's not a perception either but proven by Auditor-General and Public Service Commission reports.

In my posts about our experiences with Groote Schuur Hospital and Western Cape Health Department and our complaints to various agencies including South African Police Services (SAPS), National Prosecutions Authority (NPA) and Health Professions Council of SA (HPCSA), I relate a succession of poor service, poor attitude and unethical and and illegal conduct. It continues.

Two weeks ago I wrote to the clerk at Cape Town Inquest Magistrate Court asking for progress on my mother's case (see in this blog).  They had the docket since last year but no one has bothered to inform us of its status. The magistrate and NPA expressly told me I must communicate with the clerk, not them.

She had not replied to my emails and in good faith I continued sending her requests and information for if and when the case is heard.  So I said if I didn't hear from her, I would contact the NPA and magistrate. Now she replied that she can't tell me anything because it's not her place to. Annoyed, I asked why she didn't say so before, that she was discourteous, misled me and wasted my time, typical of public employees.

She furiously replied, "Do not twist my words to justify your warped opinion of Public Servants ... You are not allowed to communicate with the [magistrate] directly!!! ... Your poorly veiled slurs and insults will not force the inquest to be finalised sooner. We have other grieving families who seek finality in their loved ones matters too. Older than this one. Please be patient [sic]."

I had not twisted her words or spoken untruths. Before in that thread she wrote "once she [the magistrate] has read the docket and made findings (emphasis added)", i.e. a desktop inquiry shall be conducted, they'll contact us. But the Inquests Act stipulates the magistrate may summon "any person to give evidence at the inquest at the request of a person who has a substantial and peculiar interest in the inquest", in this case, my family.

Since the start in 2017 there was extremely poor communication from SAPS, NPA and Court. Her contemptuous response is typical (Salt River Forensic Pathology Service is good, though). They're oblivious of their duty and insensitive to victims and their families. They act as if signing in to work and doing their jobs is doing the public a favour. "Bugger off, I'm busy", is their attitude.

The NPA are generally uncommunicative and unhelpful. In 2018 the Wynberg Magistrate Court's prosecutor, where this case originally was, and NPA gave us the runaround. For months we were in the dark until by accident I learned it had been transferred to Cape Town. Due to their mishandling and incompetence, the case was a mess and politically tainted. Last year the magistrate herself told me she had heard rumours about it.

Last September the Woodstock detective came to see my sister and I – the first time we spoke to or met him after me trying very hard to do so in 2017 without success – more than a year after my mother died. We thought the case had been abandoned. Even he was unsure what was happening.

If the inquest clerk can't tell us the case is on the roll and when it will be heard – public information – who can?

In addition, in 2017 the NPA and SAPS facilitated then Premier Helen Zille's interference in their ongoing investigation by providing her with confidential case information.  

At the time detectives at the local police station (not Woodstock) where the case originally was (it went back and forth from Woodstock to there and back again to Woodstock, go figure) – one resigned two months later for personal reasons – literally hadn't done any work on it in three months since they received it July. (On their behalf I requested the pathology reports from Salt River forensic lab where it had been ready for four months.) When I complained to Western Cape police commissioner Khombinkosi Jula, his office got the implicated detective to investigate himself!

Of all state agencies, SAPS are arguably the nadir of the public service. But by that already low standard, all of them are in a race to the bottom. Of course, it's unfair to generalise because as with all things there are exceptions. But the police's defects deserves a blog of its own.

In my last post I wrote of the HPCSA Third Preliminary Committee of Inquiry's member, Prof. Elmin Steyn, who has a personal relationship to one of the accused, Prof. Andrew Nicol.  

Yesterday I went to the local police station (the one above) to depose a sworn statement to lay a charge under the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act. I asked the officer, a captain, which investigation agency – SAPS, Special Investigations Unit (SIU), etc – is the appropriate one to submit the complaint to (in addition to NPA which I intended to). She didn't know and said I should speak to a Col. Booysen, "He works with Justice [Department, i.e. NPA]".

Upstairs, a clerk looked for Booysen. She returned and said he'd be right along. I gather he hadn't been doing anything important. After 10 minutes I was about to leave when the clerk said I must go with her to the back office (it looked like a tip site for office rubbish). She couldn't find him but on our return to the front, I saw him in his office. 

I introduced myself, put the affidavit on his desk right side up for him to read and stated my enquiry.  He looked at me and affidavit as if I had brought a stink of shit into his office.  Right eyebrow raised with a quizzical look and not bothering to even skim the statement, he dismissively asked "What is this? Who are you? What do you want?" 

It wasn’t in a tone of professional enquiry as a policeman taking a complainant’s statement, but scepticism and aggression. He ordered – it wasn't a request – me to "sit". 

I was surprised by his hostility. I saw a person who like the inquest clerk and public employees believe the public – their clients – are there to serve them, not the other way around. I looked down and gave myself time to respond, or decide if I wanted to. 

I pointed at the statement and indicated it's all there – the first page gave the complaint summary. I wasn't going to do his job for him, repeating myself.  He looked at it and stumbled through the words "Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act" like he'd never heard of it before, as did the officer downstairs. He waved his hand in dismissal and said, "I'm not going read this". 

He asked who sent me. I told him. He asked and answered "Do you know who I am? I'm a detective" as if I didn’t know.  He had a huge ego too like half of them, the public's alleged lords and masters.

He proceeded to lecture me about his job. Annoyance rising, I stood and took the statement, saying if he was dismissive and would not help I would send it to NPA. He replied they'd contact him about me anyway. I also mentioned the SIU. He replied the “SIU is part of the police”, which is not true.  

The SIU is an anti-corruption unit, separate and independent of the police, established established in terms of the Special Investigating Units and Special Tribunal Act, 1996.  But Booysen, who is head of detectives at the station, didn't know that or the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act.  How could he be the station's mandated person to deal with the NPA and courts?

Having had enough of this fool's rudeness and arrogance and preparing to leave, I told him I'd previously had poor service from them (in 2017 they had not done a stitch of work on the related case – see above) and had complained to SAPS management about it.  Ask Capt Sias, I said.  Not meeting my eyes, he replied Sias was promoted to another station, and had told him about the case. 

Only now did he moderate his aggression, probably because I had mentioned their poor service and my complaints.  Previously insistent I must speak to him, now he demurred.  I left, sullied by the experience. Outside the officer who had deposed my statement asked if I found him.  I said I did, thank you. As I said, not all of them are as hopeless as their colleagues, but those are few and far between.

This was the third time on essentially the same case SAPS has provided appalling service. So Booysen had no reason to be smug. It was under his watch that his detectives had bungled the case in 2017 and given case information to Zille's office.

Initially I didn't understand his attitude except he was reluctant to take the time to send me in the right direction. But later I realised his bluster tried to hide he didn't know the law I referred in my complaint and to which agency it should go. Here's a senior policeman, a liaison with the Justice Department, who doesn't know the law and sister investigating agencies!  

His attitude is typical of at least half the public sector employees I've encountered.  They're inept, arrogant, impolite and inconsiderate to the public who in almost every way, not least competence and education, are their superiors.

But this is how the ANC government works – rewards incompetence and poor conduct and service with high office and promotions.  This is one reason why the public receives such poor service.

I emailed a scanned copy of the statement to Cape Town NPA yesterday afternoon with an account of my experience. I asked them to tell me which agency I should send the original affidavit to.

Update: Following a reminder on August 27 copying the National Director of Public Prosecutions, on September the NPA replied 6 it was receiving attention (10/09/2019).