The Democratic Alliance says it will lodge a complaint with the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) against the police and the National Forensic Science Laboratory (NFSL) over a backlog in DNA testing at the NFSL.

1. DA to lodge human rights complaint against
SAPS and NFSL over DNA backlog
The Democratic Alliance (DA) will be lodging a complaint with the South
African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) against the South African Police
Service (SAPS) and the National Forensic Science Laboratory (NFSL) over
the increasing backlogs in DNA testing at the NFSL.
The failure of the SAPS Forensic Division to process DNA samples within a reasonable
period of time is denying access to justice to thousands of South Africans and allowing
violent rapists and murderers to be released back onto our streets to rape and murder
with impunity.
A central cause of this chronic dysfunction is a collapse of the contract management
process within the Forensic Division whereby contracts are lapsing and taking months
to be renewed or awarded. SAPS Forensic Division is clearly still haunted by the
corruption scandals stretching back years to when Khomotso Phahlane was still head of
the division. It has now become clear that Minister Bheki Cele and National Police
Commissioner, General Khehla Sitole, have together failed to restore the integrity of the
Forensic Division and purge it of the ghost of Phahlane. They must therefore be held
accountable for their role in this crisis.
It was revealed in the Portfolio Committee on Police this week that the dysfunctional
contract management led to no case exhibits being processed in January and February
and that the information system used by the NFSL is offline. It was also revealed that
the consequence of these failures is that the DNA case exhibit backlog has exploded to
more than 172 000 samples – at the current trajectory the DA believes it could hit the
200 000 mark within the next five weeks. The continued backlog in testing these DNA
samples is a blatant failure to ensure access to justice for the thousands of victims of
crime in South Africa.
The DA first started raising the alarm on this issue in 2019 when the case exhibits
backlog was less than 100,000. In November last year the figure reached over 117,000
and SAPS presented an unrealistic turnaround plan which has failed to deliver any
tangible outcomes in its first four months.
We believe that this gross failure to keep the NFSL operating smoothly is a human
rights violation on the part of the SAPS as victims suffer the indignity of waiting for
justice while living in perpetual fear. We believe that it is therefore critical for the SAHRC
to investigate this matter with urgency.

2. It is the DA’s view that, in light of the above, the following fundamental rights of victims
of crimes are being violated:
– The right to human dignity;
– The right to just administrative action; and
– The right to access to courts.
We reiterate our call to the National Police Commissioner, General Khehla Sitole, and
the Minister of Police, Bheki Cele, to engage with private laboratories to address the
backlog. The continued increase in unprocessed DNA case exhibits is holding up the
wheels of justice and this situation must not be allowed to continue.
We now turn to the Human Rights Commission hoping that they will act swiftly and
investigate this matter so that consequences may be brought to bear on those
responsible. This, we believe, will go some way in restoring the dignity of victims of
crime which has been trampled on by the SAPS’ continued failures.