Private security, gated communities and and road closures

Southern Africa is no exception to the ever-growing phenomenon of private security and gated communities. Given the transitional nature of the counrty, it is hardly surprising that access to security and justice will be restricted, providing a perfect business opportunity for private security companies.

Its estimated that private security personal in SA outnumbers the SAPS by 5 to 1. Private security companies tend to be more client orientated, and also better equipped, than the SAPS.

An example that comes to mind is the number of vehicles available to private security companies, compared to that of the SAPS, let alone the quality of such vehicles. Also worrying is the fact that private security companies ‘poach’ staff from the SAPS. Many members of the then South African Police – especially those who took retirement packages at the dawn of the new dispensation have joined the private security industry.

SAPS still loses many of its good personnel to the private security industry as the latter offers greener pastures, particularly in terms of remuneration. It would appear a realistic – if not the only reasonable – option to forge working relations, or strengthen existing ones, between the SAPS, the private security industry, and civil society. This immediately calls for a discussion of boundaries and authority. Core to such a relationship would be the accountability of private security to both the state and the public at large.

The broader question however is the commercialization of security and the potential impact it would have on South African society. At first glance, it seems inevitable that the poor will be marginalised, but that should not spell disaster. On the positive side, it could be construed as a window of opportunity for creative and innovative ways of using state resources more efficiently, ultimately benefiting the poor, given that the rich can afford their own security.

Why do people who make road closures happen, get away with it? We know that the South African state prides itself for respecting the rule of law. Indeed, authorities take action when vigilante groups take the law into their own hands. When individuals close public roads it should then surely also be construed as taking the law into their own hands? Road closures, even if legal (as will now be the case in Gauteng) remain constitutionally challengeable, as it is a phenomenon that encroaches on the human rights of citizens, including the right to freedom of movement (Section 21) and the right to privacy (Section 14), as entrenched in the Constitution.

SA does not have a comprehensive national policy regarding gated communities. The private security industry is regulated by the Private Security Industry Regulation Act 56 of 2001 (hereafter ‘the Act’). If one were to apply the term private security in its broad sense, the Act should cover gated communities, but it does not. As a result very little can be gleaned from the Act when trying to deal with this issue. In the main, the
Act concentrates on the industry itself, and its regulation through the Private Security Industry Regulatory Authority as established in terms of the
Act. At most, the Act seems to cover the members of the private security industry who provide the service. Leaveing local authorities with the responsibility to regulate gated communities within their regions.

50 towns have received requests for road closures, 60% of these towns have a population of less than 500 000 people. One of the substructures of Joburg has already had 300 applications for road closures by early 2001.

The main factor to the high occurrence of gated neighbourhoods in Gauteng may be due to the exceptionally high level of the fear of crime. A victim survey conducted by the Institute for Security Studies indicated that 66 % of Joburg residents and 55% of residents in Pretoria feel unsafe in their homes at night compared to 41% in Durban and 40% in Cape Town.