Mapaballo Borotho
- It takes an average of 175 days to convict a murderer in South Africa, and 219 days in rape cases.
- Rise Mzansi says delays in justice for violent crimes amount to a crisis.
- The party is calling for more detectives, forensic specialists, and a modernised criminal justice system.
In South Africa, it takes an average of 175 days for a murderer to be found guilty by a court of law.
This was revealed to Rise Mzansi in a written parliamentary reply by the Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development, Mamoloko Kuba.
When looking at rape, it takes an average of 219 days, or an additional 22 days.
These timelines are from plea to finalisation, and do not include the period taken to investigate the crime, which can often take a year or longer.
Rise Mzansi says the rising delay in justice for victims of some of the most violent and traumatic crimes is a crisis.
“This cannot lie at the doorstep of the Justice Department or the National Prosecuting Authority alone. The South African Police Service must also play its role as part of the criminal justice value chain, as delays are a direct outcome of detectives with heavy case loads and backlogs in processing forensic evidence,” said the party’s Mabine Seabe.
Seabe says Rise Mzansi will therefore make the following recommendations in the coming budget cycle and advocate for resources to be directed towards:
- Employing and training specialist detectives
- Employing and training more forensic specialists
- Modernising the Criminal Justice System with an integrated IT database to increase efficiency, accountability and transparency, and to eliminate docket tampering and fraud.
“The most important responsibility of any government is to keep people safe,” Seabe added.
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