By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The Madlanga Commission of Inquiry heard the testimony from an anti-corruption and governance expert on the existing disclosures applicable to senior officers within the South African Criminal Justice System.
World Bank anti-corruption expert, Dr. Albertus Schoeman testified at the commission on Thursday, sharing his assessment within the country’s criminal justice system.
He said Acting Police Minister, Professor Feroz Cachalia’s, recent appearance before Parliament’s Ad Hoc Committee highlighted that while numerous mechanisms exist to safeguard integrity in the public sector, their implementation remains inconsistent.
Schoeman explained that a lifestyle review is typically conducted by an ethics officer and compares an officials declared assets and financial interests with their public income using financial disclosure forms.
A lifestyle investigation, he said, is more in-depth process in which investigations examine additional sources of information to determine whether an official had accumulated unexplained wealth from potentially illicit sources.
Schoeman testified that weaknesses in the financial disclosure system and broader institutional framework help explain why alleged misconduct and unexplained wealth among some SAPS officials may have gone undetected over the past five years.
He said SAPS has relied largely on lifestyle reviews and investigations instead of comprehensive lifestyle audits, despite the latter providing a far more complete picture of an official’s financial affairs.
“Neither the financial disclosure framework nor lifestyle reviews and investigations have unearthed misconduct in SAPS,” Schoeman told the commission.
His testimony forms part of the commission’s inquiry into whether South Africa’s current financial disclosure regime is capable of detecting corruption and preventing criminal infiltration of the country’s criminal justice system.
Schoeman told the commission that every senior management service (SMS) member submitted the required financial disclosures over the past five financial years, with only one official already under suspension failing to comply.
Yet no misconduct or unexplained wealth was detected through the disclosure process.
He explained that lifestyle reviews involve ethics officers checking whether officials’ financial disclosures correspond with information from external databases and whether their declared assets are consistent with their salaries. Cases are only escalated if discrepancies are identified.
Between the 2021/22 and 2023/24 financial years, no SAPS officials were referred for lifestyle investigations.
In 2024/25, only five of the service’s 823 senior managers underwent lifestyle investigations, and all were cleared.
According to Schoeman, full lifestyle audits – the most comprehensive level of scrutiny involving professional forensic auditors – have still not been implemented within SAPS.
“As of July 2026, SAPS is yet to start with lifestyle audits through an [Special Investigating Unit] secondment arrangement.”
He attributed this partly to the cost of conducting the audits, which can range between R30,000 and R50,000 per case.
Schoeman said the commission’s hearings have exposed serious shortcomings in South Africa’s public sector integrity framework.
He added that even when discrepancies, conflicts of interest or unexplained wealth are identified, the policy framework for imposing sanctions lacks sufficient force.
Schoeman recommended that officials be subject to strict compliance deadlines for submitting financial disclosure forms to strengthen accountability.
“Overall sanctions should be proportionate the offense. Disciplinary action of fines might be more appropriate for minor offenses such as late disclosure while providing opportunities for offenders to offer explanations for late or non-submission,” said Schoeman.
Schoeman also called for a fundamental overhaul of the institutional framework, arguing that South Africa’s fragmented approach contrasted with countries such as Botswana, where members of parliament, the executive, the judiciary and the public service were subject to a unified disclosure system overseen by a central authority.