Hawks aiming to fly solo and end reliance on external forensic accountants
The Hawks engaged members of the media on Thursday, outlining its challenges.
The national head of the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (Hawks), Lieutenant-General Godfrey Lebeya briefing the media to outline progress and take stock of milestones achieved during the 4th and last quarter of financial year 2023/2024 on 28 June 2024. Picture: GCIS
JOHANNESBURG -The Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (DPCI), also known as the Hawks, is working to curb dependence on external forensic accountants by building in-house capacity.
The directorate engaged members of the media on Thursday, outlining its challenges.
As a specialised crime-busting unit, many of the Hawks' cases require forensic analysis of financial statements.
However, Hawks head Godfrey Lebeya said there's limited capacity within the agency’s ranks for this kind of accounting.
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Lebeya said the Hawks usually have to outsource its forensic assignments to private accounting firms.
"And when we make use of external service providers, it's not a cheap process, it's very much expensive. I was faced with a decision where I had to decide as to whether I pay R1,2 million for the investigation where the amount stolen was something like R40,000," said Lebeya.
Lebeya said increasing the Hawks' in-house capacity is highly dependent on the available budget.