Johannesburg - Gauteng recorded the highest taxi-related murders in the past year, and this appears to have prompted the provincial government to raise its strategy to clamp down on the scourge.
Gauteng MEC for Community Safety, Sizakele Nkosi-Malobane, said they would do all they could to crack down on criminals in the industry.
She was reacting to the latest crime statistics released on Friday which noted that a high incidence of the violence occurred at the Mall of Africa in Midrand.
SAPS head of crime and statistics, Norman Sekhukhune, said in the first six months the police recorded 190 murders in the taxi industry, and 76 of them were committed in Gauteng.
The police said that, according to their analysis conducted by the provinces, murders associated with taxi-related violence were recorded and contributed to the increase of murders.
“Gauteng, recording the highest number of incidents, accounted for 40 percent of all murders associated with taxi-related violence and in this regard 0.4 percent of the overall murder figure, followed by KwaZulu-Natal accounting for 38.9 percent of taxi-related murders.
“The motive or causative factors leading to murders associated with taxi-related violence were found to be mostly about route disputes, internal power struggles within and between taxi associations, and revenge attacks in which hitmen were specifically hired to eliminate the victims,” Sekhukhune said.
The Western Cape recorded 23 instances of taxi-related murders, Mpumalanga had seven, the Eastern Cape five, Limpopo three, the Free State and North West one each, while the Northern Cape recorded zero instances.
Reacting to the findings, Nkosi-Malobane said: “We are aware of the violence at the Mall of Africa. The high incidence of taxi violence (stemmed from) a conflict between two rival Alexandra-based taxi associations, ATA (Alexandra Taxi Association) and ARMSA (Alexandra, Randburg, Midrand and Sandton Association).
"Both these taxi associations originate in Alexandra and their conflict was related to route disputes.
"ATA was also involved in a conflict with Ivory Park Taxi Association, also involving routes.”
Nkosi-Malobane said the feud between these associations led to a number of fatal attacks and the arrest of perpetrators. She said some of the perpetrators had gone into hiding, and police were still hunting for them.
“The conflict between ATA and ARMSA ended in court and the ruling was in favour of ARMSA but ATA was continuing to use the route.
“The premier (David Makhura) then set up a task team which comprised myself, MEC for Human Settlements Paul Mashatile, MEC for Roads and Transport Ismail Vadi and MEC for Social Development Nandi Mayathula-Khoza to address all issues related to taxi violence,” Nkosi-Malobane said.
She said the task team met every month, had already asked those taxi owners to register but few had turned up.
According to Nkosi-Malobane, there were about 10000 taxis operating in Gauteng alone. The crime statistics corroborate a report tabled in the Gauteng provincial legislature in November last year by the chairman of the portfolio committee on roads and transport, Jacob Khawe.
The portfolio committee, in its report, urged Makhura to conduct lifestyle audits on officials responsible for the issuing of taxi permits and licensing.
Some of these Gauteng government officials, including police officers, were accused of owning taxis as well as giving permits to certain individuals while ignoring others. This, in most cases, led to fatal taxi wars in the province.
The committee also heard how a taxi permit was stolen from the Gauteng Department of Roads and Transport and ended up in the hands of taxi warlords.
These warlords, according to evidence presented to the portfolio committee, would set up illegal factories in Gauteng to reproduce the same taxi permit, which they would then sell to various clients.
Clients would come from various provinces in the country to purchase these permits.
The portfolio committee also found that the police did not monitor taxi ranks constantly, which resulted in their actions being reactive and not proactive.