What is going on in the police force? Have the lunatics taken over the asylum? As South Africans we are only too aware that we live in a country that has one of the highest crime rates in the world. But a depressing realisation is setting in that we are in danger not only from those in civilian clothes – there is an increasing trend for our criminals to sport police uniforms.

Or so it seems, if the events of the past few weeks are anything to go by.

As a taster, take 15 minutes of SABC television news one night last week. It was so shocking that it beggared belief. I do not do violence very well, in real life or in the movies. I hate conflict, dodge it where I can and go to great lengths to steer clear of watching gory scenes on screen. It is not often that I have to take avoidance measures while watching the news. But the broadcast last week had so much violence in it that it became unwatchable.

The violent scenes on the screen were all home-grown. The brutality would have been shocking whoever the perpetrators were, but it was even more outrageous given that the men meting out the violence were South African policemen.

Two of the three offending news items comprised amateur footage of policemen caught in the act of brutally assaulting people. In one excruciating clip, a policeman was filmed beating and kicking a young boy whose hands were tied behind his back. The attack was gratuitous and continued even after the boy had collapsed.

The second item showed a policeman beating a man who was lying face down on the ground with his hands tied behind his back. The man in uniform repeatedly hit the victim on the back of the head. The attack went on interminably. The man on the ground tried to defend himself, an impossible feat given that he was prostrate and bound.

The third shocking item was of three men who had been rearrested after attempting to escape from Pretoria Central Prison. Two had bleeding wounds on their faces and heads. The third was wearing a neck brace. Footage taken earlier of the three being rearrested gave an inkling of how they had come by their injuries — policemen beating and kicking them, even after it was clear that they had been subdued.

What happened next was even more astonishing. We saw the bloodied men being berated by an angry minister of correctional services. With cameras rolling, the minister set about admonishing the bruised and bleeding men as though they were errant schoolchildren.

Police brutality is prevalent

Let us not kid ourselves. The news items shown last week are not isolated incidents. They indicate a systemic crisis. There are reports of crime statistics being cooked so that bonuses are paid, of police units killing suspects rather than arresting them, of women being raped and molested by men in uniform.

The situation appears to be deteriorating. Since 2001-2002, the number of assault investigations conducted by the Independent Complaints Directorate trebled from 255 to 920 in 2009-2010. The attempted murder cases it has investigated have increased more than seven times, from 43 in 2001-2002 to 325 by 2010. Last year’s statistics are likely to show an increase in these shocking numbers.

This is all symptomatic of a police force that is sans leadership, devoid of a moral compass and feels accountable to no one.

Take the leadership issue. In the middle of the three violent news items, the SABC covered the inquiry into suspended police chief Bheki Cele’s role in a number of property deals. The judge is having a hard time getting witnesses to testify and then, once he has got them on the stand, getting them to say anything comprehensible. At times, the proceedings descend into farce.

Cele’s replacement might also be in hot water. In the past few days, the Democratic Alliance has asked the public protector to investigate Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi, who was appointed as acting national police commissioner after Cele’s suspension. The investigation relates to what he did or did not know about the activities of a rogue police unit.

If that was not enough, City Press reported on Sunday that the man tipped to become the head of the police’s crime intelligence unit has been accused of spending money he should not have. But, the report went on, Lieutenant General Richard Mdluli “is unlikely to face criminal charges for his alleged deeds. The Hawks, which uncovered the rot in crime intelligence, were recently told to suspend all investigations into Mdluli and other crime intelligence fraud and corruption.”

Police must stick to the rules and guidelines

In a research paper for the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation titled “An Unacceptable Price to Pay: the Use of Lethal Force by Police in South Africa”, David Bruce writes that the police’s use of lethal force can be controlled effectively only if police leaders are committed to ensuring that members adhere to suitable standards.

No wonder, then, that communities and individuals take the law in their own hands. Last weekend the Cape Times reported that four people had been arrested in Khayelitsha for the abduction and torture of three men, whose bodies were discovered in the dunes of Macassar. They had been blamed for stealing a plasma TV.

Vigilante attacks on suspected criminals are not a new phenomenon. In his book on Diepsloot published last year, Anton Harber explains that the inability of police to be on hand when they are most needed is often what drives people to opt for summary justice.

What is particularly scary is that the actions of communities are not that far removed from the treatment being meted out by policemen in uniform. Neither has to do with justice or the maintenance of law and order.

Last year, Cele roundly defended the police force, pointing out that hundreds died every year in the line of duty and that 16 000 people were killed by “ordinary” South Africans in 2010. That is not the point. As a document prepared last year on the police and the use of force in South Africa argues: “When the police violate the law by using excessive force, they bring themselves, the law and the state into disrepute. Police who consciously abuse their powers become criminals in the process.”

As Bruce points out, the use of excessive force by men and women in uniform has particularly disturbing implications because the police are the most visible representatives of the state and its authority.

The question is: Who is going to protect us from those in uniform? On present performance, it is not those the government has assigned to do the job.