Police minister Bheki Cele’s statement that the murder rate approximates that of a war zone captures exactly what one should think about the crime statistics released on Tuesday. We are a society at war with itself. With 57 people murdered a day — an increase of 6.9% on 2017 — and 109 people reporting rape daily, this is a frightening place to live. The broad trend of the past year is an increase in murder and rape, a very large increase in the murder of women and children and an increase in attempted murder. Assault crimes and common and aggravated robbery declined slightly in the 12 months to March 2018. Cash-in-transit heists and bank robberies stand out. Both spiked over the 12-month period, with heists climbing 57% to 238 incidents and trending upwards. Bank robberies also rose sharply from three in 2017-2018 to 13 over the past year, possibly as police shifted resources to deal with in-transit heists.
There are two dimensions that need examination: the problem with polic...
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