Five years after Babita Deokaran's assassination: A call for accountability and reform

Five years after Babita Deokaran's assassination, calls for accountability and reform have intensified. The Active Citizen's Movement (ACM) believes the most fitting tribute to her memory is to establish an ethical public service culture with clear managerial protocols. They argue that management, up to the ministerial level, must be held accountable for safeguarding employees who report corruption.

The Protected Disclosures Bill (PDB), while an improvement, is not sufficient on its own, as Babita's own manager failed to protect her and no one within the Gauteng Health Department has faced accountability. The current PDB draft remains inadequate, despite improvements. A crucial step is the establishment of a non-governmental (independent) institute, well-resourced, to develop a comprehensive whistleblower protection system.

This system should offer clear procedures to protect whistleblowers, provide legal advice and defence, psychosocial support for whistleblowers and their families, income support, and methods to safeguard evidence and identities. The fight against corruption, according to the ACM, occurs in arenas where power abuse and criminal syndicates operate with impunity, employing a "politics of death" through threats, violence, and assassination.

They claim corruption is undermining the healthcare system and unfairly blames foreign nationals. Dr. Nora Saneka, the chairperson of the ACM, is a civil society leader in South Africa advocating for stronger whistleblower protection laws, human rights, and civic accountability.