The 2025 National Policing Summit kicked off in Gauteng on Tuesday, with Police Minister Senzo Mchunu revealing that the South African Police Service (Saps) is reconfiguring its organisational structure to fight crime more effectively.

The three-day summit followed a Ministerial Business Partnership dinner on Monday night where Mchunu stressed the Saps' vision of a proactive police service and noted that engagements with business have produced tangible outcomes.

He closed the dinner by urging government, Saps and business leaders to “move beyond theory and into implementation”.

This was echoed at the Summit, with this year’s theme being ‘Efficiency in Action: Optimising South Africa’s Policing Potential’.

Mchunu said the implementation of a "reconfigured organisational structure", in form and functionality, was part of efforts to transform the police service to be more proactive.

Eight months into his leadership as head of the Police Ministry, Mchunu said this time was used to understand the work done by previous administrations, as well as the challenges in the policing system.

“Among the first things to master, is exactly how to police the country effectively and efficiently amid shortages in terms of police numbers to the population, budgetary constraints, and where there is a high rate of crime and corruption, especially in the four biggest provinces, namely: Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, and the Eastern and Western Cape. The overall test we must pass is for the citizens to say we feel safe at any time and almost everywhere in our space, especially where we live - urban and rural areas,” he said.

He further noted corruption in the Saps and said his department was dealing with it “decisively”.

While the third quarter crime statistics showed a decline, Mchunu said it was "far from where we want it to be”. He noted an increase in attacks on women and children and said this was a priority for the Saps.

Additionally, he expressed concern about organised crime, which he believes is the main contributor to the country’s high crime levels.

However, Mchunu is also confident that gang violence can be eliminated.

Meanwhile, the Summit will focus on proactive policing, partnerships, infrastructure, crime intelligence and increasing the usage of technology.  

Related to this, Mchunu revealed that Saps would embark on a number of projects with business which included the piloting of five automated police stations; the digitisation of the docket management system, which he described as a persistent challenge; as well as an increase in laboratories. Business has also lent its resources to Saps to furnish its labs with new equipment as well as the establishment of an e-lab.

“We want to stay true to [the Summit’s] theme via the outcomes that we will pursue in terms of implementation throughout this year. In the end, crime must fall in South Africa,” he said.