Article: 20 years to implement police IT system: report

It could take up to 20 years to fully implement an IT system intended to be used for electronic police dockets, it was reported on Saturday.

The Saturday Star reported that the SA Police Service told Parliament that in the last 10 years, it had only managed to implement the system in 79 out of more than a 1 000 police stations.
 
Are they mad. How flippen inefficient do you have to be
 
When the system is implemented, the loss of dockets might spiral downwards.

This is just an opportunity for the crime leaders to teach their followers how to ERASE a file from a computer.
 
This cannot be more than a 1 year project -

Absolutely shocking
 
requiem said:
This cannot be more than a 1 year project -

Absolutely shocking
Click to expand...

It will take more than 1 year to roll out to 1000 sites, most of which probably don't have the infrastructure to support the system.

But 20 years is ridiculous.

Should have rolled out by region, starting with a relatively small region to iron out the last kinks, and train up people. So depending on how stable, that might take a few months. Then you ramp up the rollout.

Should have taken a year for the these 79, then possibly 2 to 4 years for the rest.
 
No matter how complex, have they never heard of a phased approach? Not that I aggree with the 20 year estimate.
 
This is always a huge problem with change management. In my experience, old people tend to resist implementation of new technology. :cry:

In addition, Parliament heard that in those stations where it was operational, there was some resistance to its use by officers who chose to continue using the old system because they were “more comfortable with it”.

Lieutenant General Bonginkosi Ngubane, the divisional commissioner for technology services said the upgrade of the police’s electronic network was also a major stumbling block for the programme.

He said about 200 police sites needed network upgrades, and that at the current pace of about 200 upgrades per year, this could take 10 years.

Cabling first needs to be installed, before equipment is delivered. Each station requires a 2Mb internet connection.

In some instances, equipment was standing unused in stations because the laying of cabling had not been completed.

Ngubane also said no sites had been upgraded in the last year because the tender process had stalled.

Ngubane admitted it had taken 10 years to get just 79 of over 1 000 police stations onto the Case Docket Management System, and it could thus take another 20 years before all stations were fully enabled.
Click to expand...
 
An ISS opinion piece by Bilkis Omar in August last year suggested each e-docket is first indexed and registered on the Crime Administration System (CAS) before being scanned on a centralised system, accessible at the SAPS Information and System Management (ISM) component at head office. “No scanning images are stored at station level and once the information has been stored, it cannot be deleted,” she said. The added benefit of the system is the ability of ISM to undertake audit trails of dockets within the new system. An additional benefit of the system to complainants and the police is a SMS notification system. “This is meant to alleviate much of the other challenges facing police, and mostly detectives, at stations.” It provides:
CAS numbers to complainants once the case is registered
Updates on cases to complainants, for example, if the case is transferred to another investigating officer, this will be communicated to the complainant via sms.
Minimal paperwork for the police and eases delivery of information to complainants.
Whether this is the case is unclear.

The e-docket system is part of a wider IT upgrade in the police service and in the justice cluster. Other initiatives include finally digitising the police photographic archive, automating the the criminal administration system (CAS), as well as a Property Control and Exhibit Management (PCEM) system to link the country's police stations and about 760 courts. Other policing IT priorities are upgrades to the Forensic Science Laboratory and geospatial information systems for border control. Police stations are also getting their own command-and-control centres.

Depending on one's point of view, the state has either been fast or slow to embrace IT in the fight against crime. National Prosecuting Authority acting Chief Information Officer (CIO) Marnus Steyn told ITWeb's iweek magazine in June 2008 that the the state has been working on an integrated justice system (IJS) since 1995. This, he said, was “a massively complex transversal 'crime to time' business process re-engineering scheme that when completed will give the appropriate people the appropriate information at the appropriate time to successfully prosecute crime, administer the courts and rehabilitate and reintegrate offenders.

Steyn said the IJS had two legs, one civil, to deal with divorce, delict and the like, and one criminal. Within the Department of Justice (DOJ), the NPA was at the time responsible for the latter. Departments and agencies involved with the NPA in creating a working integrated criminal justice system (ICJS) were the police, the NPA, the DOJ and the Department of Correctional Services (DCS). Thy were subsequently joined by the National Treasury and the Department of Home Affairs (DHA). "To build an ICJS is a huge challenge, and I don't think we realised this when the initiative started in 1995. We knew it would be a whale we had to eat, but we didn't know the size of it, and it has taken a long time to get to grips with the problem," Steyn told iweek.
Click to expand...

http://www.defenceweb.co.za/index.p...et-deadline&catid=3:Civil Security&Itemid=113
 
Problem is the bureaucracy will never learn from past mistakes.

I would NOT have have any problem with the guavamint spending 100 Billion Rand!!! if they could get a working and effective schooling administrative system as well as an effective police administrative system as well as an effective public service online administrative system ...

If the ANC could get this right ... like I'm sure the white government (had they still existed today) would have gotten right ... I would vote ANC.


EDIT:

BECAUSE THERE ARE A FEW THINGS MORE IMPORTANT TO ME THAN RACIAL POLITICS.

If a party deserve my vote I will give it to them.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Implement a computer-based internet-requiring system in a country where the minority of the populace have access to computers or the internet, and the internet infrastructure is execrable to say the least? Which dumbs**t came up with this idea and, more importantly, who signed off on it? Follow the money...
 
The_Assimilator said:
Implement a computer-based internet-requiring system in a country where the minority of the populace have access to computers or the internet, and the internet infrastructure is execrable to say the least? Which dumbs**t came up with this idea and, more importantly, who signed off on it? Follow the money...
Click to expand...

Erm, it does not reqiuire internet access. Police stations are already linked and they are running their own intranet as part of SITA if I'm not mistaken. There are actually some good systems out there but this 20yr thing is absolute BS though
 
The_Assimilator said:
Implement a computer-based internet-requiring system in a country where the minority of the populace have access to computers or the internet, and the internet infrastructure is execrable to say the least? Which dumbs**t came up with this idea and, more importantly, who signed off on it? Follow the money...
Click to expand...

In this case, I don't imagine that internet access is so much the issue as dedicated network infrastucture. I'm not familiar with the specific standards applied by the SAPS or the SA government generally but I imagine that they would have some additional requirements compared to your average business. Indeed, certain parts of the network infrastucture would likely need to be physically isolated from the internet for security reasons.
 
InvisibleJim said:
In this case, I don't imagine that internet access is so much the issue as dedicated network infrastucture. I'm not familiar with the specific standards applied by the SAPS or the SA government generally but I imagine that they would have some additional requirements compared to your average business. Indeed, certain parts of the network infrastucture would likely need to be physically isolated from the internet for security reasons.
Click to expand...

They already have that.
 
Mila said:
Why Is this 10 years late?
Click to expand...

Because South African IT is a mess.

It's mostly focused on SME 's

There is a serious shortfall of skills in project managing large projects. Barely enough for the private sector.

Add to that the fact that contracts with the govt are highly political(not really different to any country, tbh), and you have a recipe for a cock-up of epic proportions.

Ofc, we should also ask how come the previous govt didn't do this ?
 
zippy said:
Because South African IT is a mess.

It's mostly focused on SME 's

There is a serious shortfall of skills in project managing large projects. Barely enough for the private sector.

Add to that the fact that contracts with the govt are highly political(not really different to any country, tbh), and you have a recipe for a cock-up of epic proportions.

Ofc, we should also ask how come the previous govt didn't do this ?
Click to expand...
I'm asking because they have been in the proses has been going on for 10 years. They have not been able to get a centralized data base going. And I do not agree with your statement about SA it, and even if it was why did they not get international experts.
The pervious government? IT 20 years ago was almost non existing. Thanks to apartheid in a large part and narrow minded people.
 
Mila said:
I'm asking because they have been in the proses has been going on for 10 years. They have not been able to get a centralized data base going. And I do not agree with your statement about SA it, and even if it was why did they not get international experts.
The pervious government? IT 20 years ago was almost non existing. Thanks to apartheid in a large part and narrow minded people.
Click to expand...

IT 20 years ago almost non-existing ?
Tell that to the banks and insurance companies :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top
Sign up to the MyBroadband newsletter
X