Durban — The parliamentary portfolio committee on police will be heading to KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape to visit forensic laboratories to assess progress in eradicating DNA analysis backlog.
The first stop for the committee will be the lab in Amanzimtoti which was damaged during the floods in April followed by the lab in Gqeberha which is not fully operational.
Committee chairperson Tina Joemat-Pettersson said the portfolio committee would this week undertake an oversight visit to Forensic Science Laboratories (FSL) in both KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape.
The visit is in line with Section 55 (2) of the Constitution, which empowers the National Assembly to provide a mechanism to ensure that all organs of state are accountable to it.
Joemat-Pettersson said as the country intensified the fight against gender-based violence (GBV) and other crimes, a fully efficient FSL function was critical in driving the science-led conviction of perpetrators.
She said with that in mind, the committee had in the previous three financial years held interactions with the SAPS senior management team to deal directly with the backlog of over 240 000 DNA analyses, which have had a negative impact on the fight against crime, especially GBV and murder cases.
Joemat-Pettersson said the committee welcomed the minister’s recent announcement that following substantial investment in resources and procurement of necessary consumables, the backlog had been reduced substantially. The visit would on a broader level serve as a platform to assess the impact of the investments and lessons learnt to ensure that the same problem does not recur.
“The focus on the two provinces is necessary because the FSL located in Amanzimtoti (KZN) was damaged significantly during the 2022 flooding in the province. The visit will assess the level of damage and progress with repairs to ensure the laboratory functions optimally.
“The Eastern Cape FSL located in Gqeberha is not fully operational and is expected to operate at capacity in April. The visit will assess the laboratory’s readiness to function to capacity at the start of April,” Joemat-Pettersson said.
She said additionally, the committee would also visit the New Brighton police station in Gqeberha on Friday.
The New Brighton police station is number six on the top 30 police stations for murder nationally. The committee’s visit to the station is to assess the impact of the interventions to bring down the murder rate in the area.
Last month when Police Minister Bheki Cele released the quarter three crime statistics, reflecting crimes reported between October and December 2022, he said the SAPS had cleared its historic DNA backlog.
Cele said as of February 16, the DNA backlog which was initially over 241 000 was at 1 600.
“This is a 99.3% reduction in the country’s DNA backlog figures,” Cele said.
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