Police have destroyed nearly 19 000 firearms seized in crime-fighting operations around the country.
“Police have in the past 12 months permanently removed 65 519 firearms from circulation with 18 927 firearms being destroyed last week,” said SAPS spokesperson Colonel Athlenda Mathe.
Mathe said police had resolved to find and remove illegal firearms and ammunition from the hands of criminals.
“Most of the firearms included handguns, rifles, shotguns and firearm parts and combination firearms. These had either been seized during crime prevention and Intelligence-driven operations; voluntarily surrendered or forfeited to the state during the 2019/2020 and 2020/2021 Firearms Amnesty period,” Mathe said.
She said 20 590 firearms were destroyed in July 2022, and 26 002 in March 2022.
“The SAPS confirms that all 65 519 firearms were cleared after they had been subjected to ballistics testing to determine if they had possibly been utilised during the commission of any crime,” Mathe said.
She said most of these firearms were either surrendered and voluntarily handed over to the state during the 2019/2020 as well as the 2020/2021 Firearms Amnesty period, confiscated and seized by police in intelligence-driven operations and routine stop-and-searches, and after receiving tip-offs from the public.
The SAPS report comes amid growing calls for stricter gun laws in South Africa after the murders of Kiernan 'AKA' Forbes and Tebello ‘Tibz’ Motsoane in Durban’s Florida Road on Friday.
According to the NGO Gun Free SA, 30 people are murdered in the country every day, and 9 855 guns are reported lost or stolen in a year.
In a statement on the 2021 massacres in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, Adèle Kirsten of Gun Free SA said the government had not used the massacres to develop a strategy and plan of action to deal with rising levels of gun violence and curb gun proliferation.
“To deal with the scale of the problem right now requires a clear strategy, good intelligence and the focus has to shift from not only arresting the criminals but to also recovering and destroying the guns to stop them being used again and again, as well as to stopping guns leaking into criminal hands in the first place,” Kirsten said.
Speaking to eNCA, Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi said it was time the government took a firm stance on gun laws.
“Our lekgotla was very clear that we will approach the legislators and that we need a debate and serious action to be taken on strengthening gun laws across the board,” Lesufi said.
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