Chapter 7
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| Countries | Additional legislation required |
| Botswana | Money-laundering. Mutual legal assistance. Stiffer penalties. Legislation on banks to disclose/report unusual transactions. Improved definitive legislation on intellectual property. |
| Lesotho | Enactment of money-laundering legislation with stiffer penalties and more legislation on economic crimes. |
| Malawi | Legislation to make provision for the recognition of criminal organised groups and relevant offences. Appropriate sentences for the offences so created. All aspects of criminal activities perpetrated by organised criminal groups to be provided for. |
| Namibia | Vehicle theft, mutual legal assistance, proper uniform database on stolen vehicles. More effective and uniform legislation on the extradition of fugitives. |
| South Africa | Training in legislation for officers essential. Difficult, even with proper legislation in place, to identify some organised criminal activities such as money-laundering. Ratification of Convention Against Transnational Organised Crime. Prohibiting individuals from belonging to an identified organised criminal group. |
| Swaziland | Money-laundering and asset forfeiture legislation. |
| Tanzania | Additional legislation to cover computer crime. |
| Zambia | |
| Zimbabwe | Legislation should be more specific to organised crime. Separate statutory provisions for the common law crime of theft of motor vehicles. Corruption Act needs updating, strengthening and finetuning to make it more responsive to current needs. Legislation to provide for stiffer and mandatory sentences. Bail to be precluded from certain classes of organised crimes. |
No clear patterns emerged from these responses. However, the Botswana, Lesotho, and Swaziland police agencies identified the need for legislation to combat money-laundering. While South Africa did not appear to have any legislative needs relating to money-laundering, it did refer to the difficulty in identifying money-laundering activities. Even though the Zambian police agency did not respond to this question, it appears to experience significant problems with money-laundering activities by organised criminal groups. According to the head of the Zambian Drug Enforcement Commission, the US Central Intelligence Agency has labelled Zambia as a centre for money-laundering in the region.39 He stressed the need for legislation to combat money-laundering and stated that drug-trafficking and its related money-laundering activities "have emerged as a national problem for transparency and good governance."40
Money-laundering appears to be a serious problem in the SADC region which has to be addressed more aggressively nationally and regionally with the assistance of the international community. It would assist law enforcement agencies in the region if existing and new money-laundering legislation in the region could be harmonised as far as possible. The need for regional co-ordination on this issue is therefore important. This should go hand-in-hand with legislative provisions for the forfeiture of the assets of money launderers.
The SARPCCO Legal Subcommittee is charged with the task of promoting the harmonisation of legislation that impacts on organised crime. It faces a mammoth task, bearing in mind the very meagre resources that are available for its work and the fact that SADC countries have inherited substantially different legal systems from the erstwhile British and Portuguese colonial legal systems.41
International assistance
It is hardly necessary to provide reasons why international assistance is crucial to the developing countries of Southern Africa. If transnational organised crime is to be combated effectively in the region, as well as through international responses, such as those envisaged in the UN Convention against Transnational Organised Crime, then the international community should be concerned about the weak link in its chain in the form of Southern Africa.
The views of police agencies in Southern Africa on the role of international assistance were therefore elicited by asking respondents whether they thought that international assistance to their police service or to the criminal justice system in their your country would assist in combating organised crime more effectively.
Respondents were requested to answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’. All nine police agencies felt that such assistance was necessary. The next question thus requested that respondents provide an indication of the form of international assistance which they viewed would contribute the most towards combating organised crime more effectively in their country. Examples of such assistance were provided and included detective training, border control, training in narcotics detection, and others (see table 14).
Table 14: Preferred form of international assistance for SADC member countries to curb transnational organised crime
| Countries | Type of international assistance |
| Botswana | Detective training. Border control. Creation of organised crime section. |
| Lesotho | Examples provided in the question, as well as training in diamond-related crimes and electronic fraud detection. |
| Malawi | Detective training specialising in investigating organised crime such as drug and firearms-trafficking. Training of border control personnel to be informed of features of organised crime. Legislation that may form part of a broader law on the prevention of all forms of organised crime such as illicit trafficking in firearms, smuggling of persons. |
| Namibia | Training in commercial fraud. Training in organised crime investigation. Environmental crime. |
| South Africa | Training in identifying, investigating and disrupting tactics of organised criminal groups. Resources, such as computers and software to analyse organised crime. Training of organised crime analysts. |
| Swaziland | Legal assistance in drafting additional legislation. |
| Financial assistance to obtain advanced technology and equipment. | |
| Tanzania | |
| Zambia | Training of officers involved in crossborder crime investigations. Exchange of intelligence reports on movements of crossborder criminals. Advanced communication between member countries. |
| Zimbabwe | Training: detectives, border control, intelligence, specialised operations. |
| "Resources: computers, surveillance systems, filed training kits." |
The responses in table 14 point to the overwhelming need for training. This should be an important focus area for international assistance. Developed countries should be able to assist with training at a relatively low cost. SARPCCO has established the Training Subcommittee to identify training needs in member countries and to develop relevant curricula for the training of police throughout the region. Training courses have been held, also with international assistance, and a detective training school is to be established in Botswana. A good start has therefore been made to address training needs, but far more assistance will be required to make a real impact on policing in the region.
A question that will arise is whether international assistance to Southern African law enforcement agencies should be co-ordinated and multilateral, or whether bilateral programmes with donor countries are preferable. The answer is probably that both bilateral and co-ordinated multilateral assistance programmes would be appropriate. The needs are so overwhelming that the region is likely to welcome any relevant assistance. Most countries have benefited from ongoing bilateral assistance programmes, although assistance packages in some cases were clearly more suited to the conditions prevailing in the donor country than in the recipient country. While the benefits of bilateral assistance programmes cannot be refuted, they sometimes tend to ignore the fact that there are regional structures such as SARPCCO in place that should be part of such programmes in future. SARPCCO is better placed to act in the regional interest than individual police agencies. Multilateral regional co-operation arrangements should therefore receive more serious consideration than in the past. The region as a whole is likely to benefit more from such programmes.
For regional assistance programmes to be effective, SARPCCO should be prepared to facilitate them. It will have to undertake its own regional needs assessment with the involvement of member countries. It will require regional co-ordination and prioritisation. Such an approach is preferable to one where every member country state presents its own ‘wish list’ for international assistance to developed countries or international organisations.
Improved co-operation between SADC member countries
SARPCCO, the regional police chief’s organisation tasked with co-ordination, is only a few years old and it must be assumed that there is considerable room for improving regional co-operation between law enforcement agencies. In order to obtain police agencies’ views on this matter, respondents were asked whether they thought that improved co-operation between SADC member countries would lead to a more effective fight against organised crime in the region.
Respondents were requested to answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’, and all responded positively. The next question then sought to obtain the views of police agencies on how best to enhance regional co-operation in fighting organised crime (see table 15).
Table 15: Ways to improve regional co-operation in the fight against organised crime in SADC member countries
| Countries | Suggested improvements in regional co-operation |
| Botswana | Exchange of information on crime trends/criminals. Review of extradition treaties and procedures between member countries. Mutual legal assistance in criminal matters and response to requests. Joint operations. |
| Lesotho | Joint operations and training. Harmonisation of laws against organised crime. |
| Malawi | Facilitating the exchange of information on all organised crime matters. Joint efforts through operations by targeting groups of people who are directly or indirectly involved in this type of crime. Assist each of the member countries with the necessary expertise and technical assistance. |
| Namibia | Joint operations such as Operation Atlantic, Makhlu. In cases of syndicates, conduct joint investigations. Extradition treaties must also be harmonised. |
| South Africa | Implementing a standard crime threat analysis process in all border countries. Centralised database for all SADC member states |
| Swaziland | Promoting of joint operations. Harmonisation of national laws. |
| Tanzania | Regular meetings, seminars, training, joint operations. |
| Zambia | Collection of information. Retrieval of recovered property and arrested persons. |
| Zimbabwe | Updating and expanding SARPCCO structures and duties. |
Among the suggestions made by police agencies, two appear to have relatively broad support:
- The first relates to joint police operations in the region. While a number of operations have been executed since the formation of SARPCCO in 1995, there appears to be a belief that more are necessary. Police agencies in Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia, Swaziland, and Tanzania all referred to joint operations in their responses.
- The second area relates to various aspects of the collection, capture and dissemination of information. Botswana identified the need to improve the exchange of information relating to crime trends and criminals. Malawi referred to the facilitation of the exchange of information on matters of organised crime. The South African Police Service highlighted the need for a centralised database for all SADC member countries, and Zambia indicated that more information would become available if there was closer co-operation on matters related to organised crime in the region.
