The first national workshop on victim empowerment and support held at the World Trade Centre in August 1996 was a joint initiative of the South African Police Service (SAPS) and the Institute for Defence Policy (IDP), in consultation with other role players. It succeeded in bringing together various interest groups and role players in the field, enabling them to begin discussing a comprehensive victim policy for South Africa.

MAIN SPEAKERS

The speakers during the plenary session on day one were introduced by Mark Shaw, leader of the crime and policing policy project at the IDP, who chaired the session.

Senior superintendent Juan Nel, national co-ordinator of the RDP victim support programme (VSP) of the SAPS, sought to place the workshop in context. He referred to a workshop held at the end of 1995 between government and NGOs on the role of the police in victim support. However, in line with the National Crime Prevention Strategy (NCPS) and the principles of the RDP, further consultation and engagement was needed with the community, the government, and other stakeholders on issues surrounding victims of crime. Although the department of welfare had been assigned as the lead department in respect of the NCPS victim empowerment and support programme (VESP), he explained that this had only become known in June 1996.

After having been appointed to his position in November 1995, he found himself under pressure to 'deliver' within the framework of the RDP. As a result, he had convened a meeting held at the University of South Africa (Unisa) on 31 July 1996 in order to engage and consult with various stakeholders, including government, the NCPS team, and other NGOs working in the field. Various issues, including a possible national workshop to clarify the roles and responsibilities of the various stakeholders, were discussed. At this meeting, he had learnt that the IDP's crime and policing policy project was planning a similar workshop, and it was decided to pool resources. In organising the workshop, regular consultation had taken place on the programme, the role players, and the agenda. Nel referred to this as an 'excellent example of the possibilities for co-operation between NGOs and the SAPS'.

Nel stressed that while the police often had first contact with victims of crime, they could only play a limited role in supporting victims, and were dependent on other role players. An important part of this role was to refer victims to appropriate support services in the community. In order for the SAPS to play a more substantial role in supporting victims, it had become crucial to clarify the roles to be played by various agencies, and assign specific responsibilities to them.

A message of support from the office of Sydney Mufamadi, minister of safety and security, was read out to the workshop.2

Lala Camerer, a researcher on the crime and policing policy project, welcomed delegates to the workshop. She stressed that it was a workshop rather than a conference, and that it was up to delegates, service providers and policy-makers alike to ensure its success by reaching consensus and coming up with practical recommendations on how to carry the process forward. The question of a national co-ordinating body was raised, as was the importance of defining the roles of various stakeholders.

The opening address was delivered by Dr Leila Patel, director-general of the department of welfare, lead department for the NCPS VESP. Patel stated that there was a growing awareness within government of the needs and rights of victims of crime as part of a multidisciplinary, comprehensive and national crime prevention strategy, and pointed out that the NCPS emphasised the connection between crime prevention and socio-economic development. The VESP was a priority programme, as it focused on a neglected area, and very little had been done to support victims of violence in general. However, it was not always possible to distinguish between political and criminal violence. Victimisation and an exposure to violent crime led to a loss of public confidence, feelings of helplessness, and a loss of control, as personal safety was threatened. Safety was a basic human right, and it was critical that government and civil society co-operate to secure this right.

Patel stated that there was a clear need for a better safety net. The criminal justice system also had to be made more victim-friendly, accessible and service-oriented. There was a need for training, and all stakeholders had to be involved to minimise the effects of crime on victims. She referred to the United Nations definition of victims as a comprehensive and sound starting point around which the development of intervention strategies for different needs could begin. While victims could become perpetrators under certain circumstances, she warned against oversimplifications in this regard. The challenge of the national workshop was to develop a strategic plan to be implemented by different government departments and partners. It was critical for roles and responsibilities to be defined and clarified, and a mechanism developed to take the process forward.

Patel warned against duplicating or creating large unwieldy structures, and stressed the need to build on existing initiatives. She said it was important to acknowledge the efforts already being made within civil society. Government had not given these initiatives the recognition they deserved. Current services were largely located in urban areas, fragmented, and not suited to the needs of rural communities. While funds could presently be accessed from cross-cutting RDP funds totalling R170 million, victim-related programmes would in time be integrated into departmental budgets.

She said she did not want to create the impression that the taps were opening for a flow of funds towards victim support, as there were a whole range of priorities within the NCPS. Programmes would need to be concrete, have maximum impact, be affordable, and build on community-based initiatives. While one could draw on models from elsewhere in world, it was important to keep local needs and realities in mind.

The keynote address was given by Prof Jan van Dijk, director of strategic planning and programmes in the ministry of justice in The Netherlands, and professor of criminology at Leyden University. Van Dijk's paper on victim empowerment and support in an international perspective appears in full hereafter. It consists of two parts:

research findings from the International Crime Survey in which 100 000 citizens of more than 40 countries (including South Africa) were polled on their experience of crime, their treatment by police, as well as on how they would like to be treated; and



an overview of models of victim support, namely the criminal justice model and the care and crime prevention models, the latter being, in his opinion, the most effective. Van Dijk stressed the need for support from various welfare agencies and the community, and argued that the criminal justice system should also have a policy for dealing with the victims of crime.

Graeme Simpson, director of the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation, addressed the workshop on 'Crime and violence: the need for victim support in South Africa'. His presentation appears later in this publication.

Janine Rauch, convenor of the NCPS, gave a brief presentation on the strategy. She stressed that it was a co-ordinated, long-term (25 years) government strategy for crime prevention, aimed at preventing people from becoming victims and criminals. As such, it was not primarily geared to apprehending those who were already criminals. It was heavily focused on the youth, believing in investing in the future to prevent crime. The aims of the NCPS were thus to prevent crime; guide departments towards a shared understanding of crime prevention; integrate policy objectives; establish national, regional, and local partnerships; improve the flow of information about crime; and mobilise resources in a more co-ordinated manner. It was intended to inspire greater confidence in the government's ability to combat crime.

Rauch stressed the importance of the disaggregated nature of crime – ie, an understanding that different crimes had different causes and categories of victims, and therefore required different solutions and strategies. The NCPS was about governance and the transformation of government departments. The challenge was to maintain and strengthen a commitment to human rights.

Lala Camerer responded to recent policy initiatives, such as the NCPS. Her paper on 'Victims and criminal justice in South Africa' appears later in this publication. She sketched the different phases in social movements, which include incipiency, coalescence, institutionalisation, demise and fragmentation, and argued that the workshop might herald the institutionalisation phase, characterised by society-wide co-ordination around a particular issue, of South Africa's fledgling victim support movement.

It was important not to bypass this opportunity before citizens became too apathetic and debilitated by crime to do anything. She noted that while the bill of rights protected the human rights of all South Africans, the constitution spelled out the rights of offenders, not the rights of victims.

The strength of the NCPS, she said, lay in its victim-centric approach to crime prevention. In order to help avoid confusion between lead departments, victim support and victim empowerment should be distinguished from one another. While the department of welfare played a key role in providing services and support, the departments of safety and security and justice could play a complementary role in providing victims of crime with information, and referring them to community services. The NCPS combined both approaches.

Camerer stressed that awareness needed to be created around victims of all crimes, and that there was a need to restore a balance to the criminal justice system.

Representatives of all four government departments specified in the NCPS VESP were invited to the workshop, to give them an opportunity to state how they were addressing the challenges posed by the NCPS in respect of victims of crime.

Besides the presentation by Patel, the department of welfare – assigned as the lead department of the NCPS's programme for victim empowerment and support – was represented by Dr Eddie Harvey. He noted that the department had already forged close ties with NGOs which provided various services and expertise. These included information, capacity-building, education, and the development of services. The major constraint from the department's side was related to the funding of those services. He believed a national body would need to identify categories of victims and the roles of various government departments, and establish a national network of service providers.

The department of justice was represented by Percy Monareng and Dreyer van der Merwe. They argued that the criminal justice system needed to act as a deterrent. There needed to be an element of predictability, so that it would constantly be in the minds of criminals that they would be apprehended. They mentioned special steps the department had taken regarding child witnesses, and special courts for the victims of sexual abuse. They acknowledged that victim compensation was currently totally ineffective, and that restitution largely depended on the ability of the accused to pay up.

The department of health was unable to send a representative, but wished the workshop success with its deliberations. In a letter to the organisers, the director-general of health, Dr J H Pretorius, said the "issue of violence and the consequences for the health sector have been identified as a very important issue for the health sector to address".

Attention was drawn to a workshop on 27 and 28 February 1996, hosted by the department and attended by representatives of government departments and NGOs. It was decided that a national workshop be held in 1997 in order to promote an alliance of role players to implement nationally agreed strategies for peace, and to co-ordinate assistance to victims of violence.

The department was committed to dealing, with other role players, with the issues of violence, victim empowerment and support. Besides this, South Africa had introduced a draft resolution on violence as a public health priority at the ninth conference of the World Health Organisation (WHO) in May 1996; it was accepted, and was to be implemented by all member states.

Deputy national commissioner John Manuel of the SAPS dealt with its VESP in the context of the transformation of the service and the philosophy of community policing. He pointed out that the white paper on the RDP had specifically assigned responsibility for community empowerment on safety and security matters such as crime awareness, crime prevention, police procedures and victim aid to the department of safety and security. He also explained the linkages with the NCPS programme on victim empowerment and support.

Manuel emphasised the importance of partnerships and joint responsibility for, among other things, victim empowerment and support. He provided a brief overview of a process of consultation on which the SAPS had embarked, and of the current status of the VESP. He explained his department's view on the role of the police in supporting and empowering victims, and, in conclusion, restated his department's commitment to the programme. The SAPS's role in victim support is dealt with more fully later.

On day two, Dr Rika Snyman, a criminologist from the University of South Africa (Unisa), proposed a model for a national body for victim assistance to be discussed by the delegates. Extracts from her paper appear later in this publication.

Although most of the programme for the afternoon of day two was compromised, because of the time taken to elected an interim steering committee, superintendent Nico Els of the SAPS's national training section convened a session around the development of training curriculae on victim support for police personnel. This session was mainly attended by representatives of the department of safety and security and the National Network on Violence Against Women. From this discussion, a proposal was put forward to establish a guardian/oversight committee consisting of various stakeholders involved in training around victims of specific crimes.

Support was expressed for stronger links among relevant NGOs and the department of safety and security on training issues. SAPS spokespersons said the service did not have the resources to pay external trainers to conduct all the training, but a it might participate in a joint venture for developing a curriculum and training personnel. As regards the training of police officials, they said all police officials would first be trained in basic skills, and then attend more specialised courses on rape or domestic violence, for instance.

Flowing from a suggestion made at the national workshop, the SAPS RDP victim support programme forum resolved to stage a workshop on victim support training programmes for police personnel on 21 October 1996 to:

provide an orientation with regard to the SAPS' occupation-specific modular training system;



discuss matters to be included in a national curriculum for victim support training; and



establish a guardian committee as envisaged by the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA), which will develop a curriculum for victim support training programmes

THEMES

A number of common themes emerged during the workshop. Although as many of them as possible will be documented in this publication, those mentioned under the following broad headings are by no means comprehensive. Rather, they reflect some of the most pertinent issues and concerns raised by delegates.

Conceptual clarity

There is a need to define what is understood by concepts such as 'victims'; 'survivors'; 'victim support'; 'victim empowerment'; 'secondary victimisation'; 'victimisation surveys'; 'compensation' and 'restitution', to name a few.



Victims can be categorised into various groups, for instance the elderly, women, children and youths. (It was noted that the elderly may not want special attention because of their age.)



Clarity is needed on which groupings are to be catered for.

Education, research and public awareness

There is a need for continuing research and education on issues surrounding victims.



Key concepts related to victimisation and victim support need to be communicated in lay terms through the mass media to members of the public as well as the police, civil servants and politicians.



Service providers need to be educated in concepts related to victims.



The macho image of 'boys don't cry' needs to be challenged.



The community needs to be politicised around victim issues.



Advocacy around victim issues needs to take place.

Resources and priorities

There are limited resources for assisting the victims of crime.



There is a need to prioritise these limited resources.



A distinction can possibly be made between services for the privileged (those who can afford them) and the underprivileged (possibly more the state's responsibility).



Services should be scalable to areas.



Support services for victims are mostly located in urban areas, and are minimal in rural areas. These imbalances ought to be addressed.



NGOs active in the field may have years of experience, but lack funds and personnel to fulfil their mission.



Should such NGOs receive funding from the state?



How should volunteers be organised and managed?



Are there enough people willing to do volunteer work?



A central state compensation fund for victims of crime is necessary.



The priorities of the police service and the justice system are not necessarily those of crime victims.

Networks (international, national, provincial and local)

Networking needs to be co-ordinated. There is a need to achieve synergy at both national and provincial level.



Contact with international networks on victim issues should be nurtured.



Urgent national action is required on assisting victims of crime.



Provinces are being held back by the lack of a clear plan of action, and national guidelines.



A national mechanism is required to co-ordinate, monitor and implement provincial initiatives through the NCPS process.



Community policing forums (CPFs) are legitimate and representative community-level structures, and ought to be utilised to address victim concerns.



Local authorities and local corporations need to be included in the process.

Roles and responsibilities

Problems with working together are noted.



Each department has its own agenda.



Role clarification between the state and civil society is necessary when it comes to offering services to victims of crime.



A strong civil society is important. In a sense, civil society will need to be empowered to play its role.



The state's commitment towards victims of crime has to be measured.



Objectives and time frames need to be determined.



Who is responsible and accountable for implementing victim support?



It is the state's responsibility to ensure the smooth running of services, such as clinics, the funding of social workers, and information systems.



What are departments/sectors other than the SAPS doing in respect of victims of crime? Welfare? Justice? Health? Education? Correctional services? The Law Commission? Community policing forums? Faith communities? Tribal authorities? Civics?



How can large corporations' employee assistance programmes (EAPs) become involved?



Where was the department of correctional services at the workshop?

Victims and the criminal justice system

Problems with the transformation processes in government are noted.



There is a need to restructure the criminal justice system.



There is an imbalance in the system regarding attention given to victims of crime versus the focus on perpetrators.



The bill of rights in the constitution should accommodate the rights of victims as well as those of offenders.



A complaints mechanism for victims of crime is needed.



Legislation affecting victims of crime needs to be examined.

Victims and the NCPS

What is the status of the NCPS as a working document?



The relationship between the workshop process and NCPS structures is unclear.



Initiatives originating from the workshop should be integrated into the NCPS.



How are these processes to be managed/organised?



Co-operation between pillar 1 (transforming the criminal justice system) and pillar 2 (community values) of the NCPS should be explored.



The NCPS has no clear objectives or time frames.



The NCPS process is not being communicated effectively.

Principles and process

It is too soon for a national body to be formed, as awareness must first be created at provincial and local levels.



A national body would need to be representative, and not dominated by government.



Co-ordination is essential in order to avoid duplicating services .



A needs assessment is vitally important to assess what is already happening.



Competition for resources should be avoided.



Consultation is necessary at every level.



The evaluation and monitoring of services is essential. Performance indicators can be used in this regard. National standards are required.



A commitment to the rights of victims of crime should not compromise human rights for all South Africans.



Victim strategies need to be multi-focused.



All stakeholders need to be equally committed.



Services must be tailored around the needs and opinions of victims, their experiences and thoughts, as well as those of their families and indirect victims.



Support for victims should take into account different cultural values.



Any victim movement must be integrated into the community policing strategy.



All victims need primary services.



All victims, not just high-profile ones, have the right to be treated in a certain way.



Swift responses and direct service provision is required.

The way forward

It is important to sustain the process.



A long-term and short-term strategy is needed.



Research and training of all criminal justice officials and service providers is essential.



Pilot projects for victim support need to be established as soon as possible.



Time frames to achieve objectives are essential.



All initiatives must be consolidated.



A list of contact numbers of service providers/workshop delegates should be distributed.

To conclude the workshop, Prof Van Dijk was asked to comment on the proceedings. After day one, he said, he had been somewhat sceptical of the possibilities for establishing a victim movement in South Africa. This was partly due to the historical divisions in South African society between state and civil society, as well as the political correctness displayed by delegates.

However, by the end of the workshop he was far more positive about the process. He was particularly intrigued by the use of the term 'victim empowerment', which he would use in future, and by the way in which consensus was reached around issues; "democracy really works in the new South Africa," he declared.

ENDNOTES

See appendix 4 for brief biographical notes on the speakers.



See appendix 7.