Smuggled illegal firearms contribute to high murder stats — crime expert

Just two years ago, an average of 20 people were killed in gun violence a day in SA.

In just six months last year, that number rose to 30 a day, according to police statistics. 

This is the tragic picture of the spiralling levels of crime in SA, which has again been brought into sharp focus following the murder of award-winning rapper AKA and his friend Tebello Motsoane.

The two were gunned down on the popular Florida Road strip in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, on Friday night. 

Police statistics show that the province has the highest number of gun-related murders in the country.

Meanwhile, organised hits and mass shootings are on the rise, according to police minister Bheki Cele. 

In an interview with Sowetan, criminologist at the University of Pretoria Prof Christiaan Bezuidenhout said the statistics were mind boggling. 

“We are turning into a murderous country. It has been known that we are a very violent country, but our quarterly statistics where firearms are concerned are mind boggling.”

From April to September 2022, a total of 13,428 people were killed in the country.

“The high murder figure can also be attributed to multiple murders where two or more people were killed in one incident. The SAPS is investigating 250 dockets of multiple murders, with 578 victims,” Cele said in November.

Bezuidenhout said illegal firearms smuggled through the country’s porous borders contributed significantly to the murder rate. 

“There are a lot of guns that come in from the borders from neighbouring countries and not much attention is given to that. The problem is the availability of guns in our country. The ease of getting firearms in the country is like going to a shop to buy sweets. 

“This is because there is a large number of illegal guns smuggled into the country, I am talking about stockpiles of high calibre firearms. People even rent out these illegal guns,” Bezuidenhout said.

He said guns were smuggled in from war-stricken countries such as Mozambique, Democratic Republic of Congo and by syndicates.

In some instances, he said extremist groups were involved in the trade of firearms to sustain themselves.

“We know that there are even extremist groups actually supplying firearms to fund themselves. We are talking about high calibre firearms, rifles, automatic weapons, AK-47. As a legal gun owner you can’t even buy an AK-47 in the country.”

“Then you have people that were previously employed as police or in the army in other countries; people who have access to firearms in those countries, they bring them into South Africa because there is a huge demand.”

“Then you have your organised criminals, syndicates who have different operations going on such as firearms, drugs and human trafficking. Those crimes have a lot of money. These syndicates search for a market globally and South Africa is that market for them.”

He said many of the smuggled firearms were used for cash-in-transit heists, hijackings, assassinations and rhino poaching.

Bezuidenhout, who conducts research through global crime monitoring organisations such as Interpol, the United Nations and the Federal Bureau of Investigations, said contract killings had become a career in the country where assassins, depending on their level of expertise and who they were tasked with killing, could charge as low as R5,000 for a hit.

Prominent people and politicians could go for up to millions of rands.

“Hired killings is a huge thriving business in our country.

“There are three basic types of hitmen; you have the amateurs who are just starting out and these are the ones who are willing to take the R5,000 and are usually very sketchy, and then you get your seasoned hitmen, a guy with previous experienced and then you get your professional hitmen; no one will know who did it because they plan properly before they carry out the assassination.”

He said guns used in such crimes were usually stolen firearms sometimes rented out and returned after the job was done.

“Police have become a soft target where criminals go for what we call ‘night shopping’ where they hold them at gun point and steal their firearms.  It is almost impossible to manage that.

“If you look at the number of guns that are stolen from the police and military bases along with the firearms smuggled in, it’s a lot. Against these highly armed gangs, it’s as though police are taking knives to a gunfight.”

DA shadow police minister, Andrew Whitfield, said while it would take more than additional people for the police to fight gun violence in the country, there was a steady decline in police officers.

“Over the last 10 years, SAPS has lost over 20,000 personnel, that includes the people who have been newly recruited. They are actually losing more people than they are taking on board.” 

“Police firearms are sold to the gang lands of the Eastern Cape, the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. These are firearms that were either confiscated by the police, or were owned by the police that appear in gang-related killings in parts of the country.

“We actually want to prevent those illegal firearms from even getting to the ground because we want to prevent the killings. Responding to gun violence is almost too little too late. We need to stop the police from selling these firearms and issuing licences to gangsters.”

Addressing the SA National Editor’s Forum council meeting in Cape Town a day after AKA’s murder, justice and correctional services minister Ronald Lamola, conceded there was a low rate of conviction against perpetrators of organised crime in SA.

“When you look at the assassination cases, in most of them there haven’t been really successful convictions and these cases are related to political killings, gangsterism, taxi industry, illegal mining and general organised crime… At this stage we are not at a point where we can say we are winning the fight against organised crime,” he said.