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Alarming number of South Africans bribe the police

Alarming number of South Africans bribe the police

A new poll conducted by BusinessTech finds that an alarming number of South Africans have bribed  a police officer.

When questioned: Have you ever bribed a police officer? Respondents answered:

No (71%, 700 Votes)

Yes (29%, 286 Votes)

According to a 2015 anti-bribery and corruption survey conducted by law firm ENSafrica, incidents of bribery have increased in Africa, with South Africa, Nigeria and six other countries cited as “corruption hot spots”.

Video footage emerged in SA, showing Greg Esterhuysen rejecting an attempted bribe solicitation by a JMPD officer on Christmas day 2014, which led to his subsequent arrest.

The video footage, captured by Esterhuysen, and posted on YouTube, went viral in January 2015.

More on bribery in South Africa

What you should do when a police officer wants a bribe

SA corruption “almost out of control”

Why do we fight corruption?


BusinessTech's Staff Writer is directly plugged into the South African Internet backbone, and spits out press releases and other news as they receive it. They are believed to be cl...
Join the Conversation (14 comments)
  • Shreez

    This is one of the many scumbags who do this every day.
    They love to call it “cooldrink money”.

  • LouisG

    Who got arrested, Greg or the cop?!!

  • John Deer

    The Public do not pay Bribes, they are being ROBBED by Intimidation by a Uniform with a TRIGGER Happy Armed COP inside.

    • Blapartheid Zulu

      Correct! We call it day light robberies by licensed criminals employee by gov

      • John Deer

        LOL Like your feedback.!!

  • Robert Dixon

    Alarming number of police accept (or worse, solicit) bribes!

    Both parties are guilty in a bribery transaction – it’s worse from the police side as they are supposed to enforce the law, not break it.
    If the police have active members with criminal records – as in SA – then only the worst can be expected.

    The inmates are running the asylum.

  • Kevin Seyffert

    What do you expect when new recruits tell training officers that they want to join for the money. When asked if they know what police are payed they openly tell the trainer, it’s not the salery they are referring to, it’s the bribes. Best part, it gets a laugh and training continues.

  • Desperate Dan

    At least that bribe goes to feed some underpaid cops family rather than some Fat cat in JZ’s over fed and over paid government. You know you are being asked for a bribe when they don’t even start writing on their pad, the minute you stop and the cop starts writing your number plate down, you know he’s honest. He can’t cancel it once he starts writing. Just wish you could bribe Sanral cameras.

  • Epah101

    Well…….. *sigh

  • Johan Lewis Last

    Get yourself a dash cam, no more bribes

  • Xileer

    Think of it as “R200 or get falsely locked in prison overnight”

  • whistledow

    We just returned from a visit to South Africa where we
    encountered an extortion attempt by a policeman while on our way to the Cradle
    of Humankind just outside Johannesburg. It
    was a traffic stop sting. We did not pay but it took 30 minutes of our time to
    convince the policeman that we would not pay him – he refused our repeated
    requests to just give us a ticket.

    We were very upset by the attempted extortion by a policeman
    and made us quite wary of police in South Africa during the rest of our visit.
    We were surprised at the number of police road blocks in South Africa – I am
    not sure why they were there but we encountered them in Johannesburg and on our
    travels to/from Kruger and St Lucia. Luckily we were not stopped at any other
    road block.

    Scary experience.

  • One sick country

    Try this, our national intelligence and saps both confirm plus admit more a gangster / human trafficking / drug smuggling network and advise me best I back I and many witnesses back off otherwise we are dead. Honest about being complicit. No wonder cops get shot

  • Call a spade a spade

    At the moment there I s no difference between the German SS and the South African Police and the South African public have spoken through the polls. Stop the rot and get rid of Hitler and the head of the SS otherwise we will have a democratic civil uprising. ” A good man who turns a blind eye to immoral activity is doomed to hell”

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