Madam Deputy Speaker, the Office for Criminal Justice System Review has, through an analysis of existing legislation and regulations in South Africa, together with a comparative overview of recent crime scenes and forensic developments in other jurisdictions, identified certain major legislative and technological constraints and deficiencies in respect of at least two pivotal aspects of our forensic crime-fighting capacity, namely fingerprinting and DNA evidence.
Despite the fact that a number of government departments administer fingerprint databases, the South African Police Services, currently due to legal and information technology reasons, only have access to the fingerprints stored on the SAPS's Automated Fingerprinting Identification System, Afis. As a result the SAPS currently has no direct access to the Home Affairs National Identification System, HANIS, of the Department of Home Affairs where the fingerprints of 31 million citizens and about 2,5 million foreigners are kept, or to the National Traffic Information System, eNaTIS, of the Department of Transport where a further six million thumbprints are kept.
In this regard, it must be noted that the Office for the Criminal Justice System Review, through an analysis of a compendium of statistics, found that in the financial year 2006-07, 52,5% or 46,2% of all crime cases, the perpetrator remained undetected. A further 11,3%, in 2006-07 and 13% in 2007-08 of cases were withdrawn before reaching court. In other words a total of 63,8% ...