Arguments, robberies and gang violence are the main reasons for killings in Cape Town, Police Minister Bheki Cele said on Thursday.
Areas in and around Cape Town and the Cape Flats recorded 83 murders over seven days from 5 to 11 September. One of the fatalities was Sergeant Sthembiso Mnatwana, 39, who was killed in Samora Machel township last Thursday. Over the weekend, Magistrate Romey van Rooyen was killed at her home and her vehicle stolen. The police have since recovered the vehicle.
The dead include children as young as six, who were shot in gang-related incidents. Cape Town and surrounding areas have been plagued by murders, armed kidnappings and taxi violence in the past weeks and numerous civil society groups have called for action from local, provincial and national governments.
“We are currently experiencing the worst and most deadly gang warfare on the Cape Flats … This is a significant increase of crime that we as communities have ever seen. We are dealing with murders every day,” said Western Cape Gang Watch.
The civil society group bemoaned the retirement of former Anti-Gang Unit boss André Lincoln and called for his reinstatement, arguing that “there is currently no clear leadership and direction”. Lincoln retired in October 2021 after his legs were amputated below the knee because of ill health.
The Western Community Cape Police Board (WCPB) expressed its concerns about the “general lawlessness and acts of violent crime in [the] province over the last few weeks”, noting the rise in the number of kidnappings of prominent business people and children, as well as attacks on police officers and increasing taxi violence.
The board called on the public to be more vigilant and report acts of criminality, saying it “stands firm that the most vulnerable in communities should be protected by our crime prevention, security and criminal justice system”.
On Thursday, Cele said that from 1 April to 11 September the province’s courts had handed down 21 life sentences in murder and rape cases and118 people were convicted for serious crimes such as rape, kidnapping and robberies with aggravating circumstances.
Over a period of one week, police seized 33 firearms and 538 rounds of ammunition on the Cape Flats, including three homemade firearms, 29 revolvers and one rifle.
“Firearms are three times likely [to be the] weapon of choice in all reported murders in the country. The Western Cape province has the third highest gun related murders, as per the last released national crime statistics,” Cele said.
He said the police’s Operation Restore drive continued “to obstruct extortion rackets and related crimes”. The team consists of integrated operations in 10 police stations in the province — Kraaifontein, Delft, Samora Machel, Lwandle, Gugulethu, Harare, Lingelethu, Philippi East, Mfuleni and Nyanga.
Cele confirmed that the police had arrested 16 people for their alleged roles in multiple
shootings in Khayelitsha and Gugulethu that claimed 58 lives. Police were also investigating 32 cases of kidnapping since the beginning of March.
“It remains encouraging that the [police] in the province continue to make inroads regarding kidnapping cases,” said Cele, adding that 15 suspects had been arrested on kidnapping charges.
On Thursday, Cape Town mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis called on the national police and Cele “to immediately establish a multi-disciplinary operational task team focused on tackling kidnapping and extortion activities in Cape Town”.
“I want to emphasise the need for immediate action from the SAPS [South African Police Service] to tackle this crisis going forward. We cannot allow a small handful of criminal syndicates to get away with these crimes in our city,” he said in a statement.
The mayor said to effectively abolish kidnapping and extortion in the city, an urgent “fully fledged extortion and kidnapping task team” that included a joint effort between national and local government was necessary.
