Armed Response: South Africa's Gun Violence

South Africa is awash with illegal firearms. The types of violent crime that are on the rise – such as cash in transit heists, armed robberies, assassinations – share one common factor: the ready availability of illegal guns that allow the perpetrators to kill, maim and intimidate.

The minibus taxi industry is at the centre of much of the violence in the country’s increasingly unstable KwaZulu-Natal province. And it is a source of hardened gunmen-for-hire. Hitmen and enforcers who make their bones in the taxi industry account for nearly half of the targeted assassinations in South Africa.
A lack of proper regulation of the industry means competitors often turn to violence to resolve conflicts, increasing the demand for illegal firearms. In Cape Town alone, at least 80 people have reportedly lost their lives in taxi violence this year.

Taxis from South Africa also operate across the border, taking customers into neighbouring states. Historically, this has given certain operators access to firearms smuggled into the country from Mozambique, which enables them to increase their own standing and influence within the industry.

The involvement of police officials in the supply of firearms to taxi operators is another cause for concern. Police do not just rent guns to members of the taxi industry, they also sell industry players their police-issue firearms as well as other weapons seized in the course of their work. But it is not only police firearms that have found their way into the taxi industry. Weapons from the South African National Defence Force and private security companies have also ended up there.

The quantities of weapons in circulation, the violence and killings can be compared to some of the world’s most serious conflict zones.

A film by Christopher Clark, Shaun Swingler and Longshot Productions for the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime. Produced by Jo Munnik.