The Minister of Police Nathi Mthethwa recently announced the latest national crime statistics at a briefing in Pretoria.
The statistics are for the year April 1, 2012, to March 31, 2013.
Rape and sexual offences crimes have declined in the past year with an increase in convictions for serious crimes, but murder and attempted murder crimes have increased in the country.
Murder has increased by 0.6%, but this is against a constant reduction over the past nine years. Attempted murder showed a similar trend with an increase of more than 6% over the past year, but was against a general downward trend over a nine-year period.
Analyst for the Institute for Security Studies Gareth Newham said serious and violent crime is increasing in South Africa. This shows that government’s approach to crime is not working.
“After a long period of decreases in serious and violent crime, these are the worst figures we have seen in 10 years,” he added.
Causes for the increase in murder were broken down per province: domestic violence and labour unrest highlighted in the Eastern Cape and North West, while drugs and drug-related turf wars were highlighted in the Western Cape.
Car-jacking, truck-jacking and robbery of residential premises have increased. Drug-related crimes showed an increase of 13.5% in the past year.
Mthethwa said convictions for contact crimes increased in the past year by about 50 000, the number of convictions is now over the 350 000 mark.
Contact crimes, contact-related crimes and property-related crimes have decreased. Incidences of fraud have also fallen.
Sexual offences are down by more than 10% compared with nine years earlier, but the decrease over the past year was only 0.4%. Rape is down by 0.4% and rape of children has seen a slightly more significant decrease of 3.3%.
“Nonetheless, we are still unhappy and concerned about the levels of rape in the country. Protection of communities is now central to our strategies aimed at reducing gender-based violence,” Mthethwa said.
He said the reintroduction of family violence, child protection and sexual offences units two years ago has contributed to the decrease, as well as an increase in life sentences.
Other crimes that decreased were:
- Assault with grievous bodily harm, reduced by 6.6% in the last year.
- Common assault, down by 7.9%.
- Common robbery, down by 2.2%.
Mthethwa said the closing of liquor outlets contributed to the reduction of these crimes.
Shoplifting and robbery at non-residential premises has decreased and cash-in-transit robberies are down by a substantial 20.3%, while bank robberies have fallen by 80% in the past year.
ATM bombings were down by 34.6% in the 2011-12 year and decreased by 18% in the 2012/13 year. Arson and malicious damage to property have also decreased.
Car and stock theft are down largely because of advanced technologies in vehicle security.
Illegal possession of firearms and ammunition is down. All other theft, including non-ferrous metals and copper cable theft has been reduced.
“We are intensifying the war on cable theft through the Second-Hand Goods Act. In essence, the act stipulates that any person who buys a stolen good is as guilty as the person who stole the goods, and harsher sentences will apply to both the buyer and the thief,” said Mthethwa.
Drunken driving cases have increased, including driving under the influence of drugs.
Public order policing remains a challenge as the number of public gatherings and protests reached 12 000. Most were peaceful, but 1 883 were violent. The police have made more than 14 000 arrests at protests in the past four years.
Most of these in the past year were South African Municipal Workers’ Union and South African Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers Union protests, or took place at Marikana and Ratanda, but not local.
“Cumulatively, we are reducing crime and this is happening against the population growth,” Mthethwa said.
“There is no doubt in my mind that the crime situation is under control,” said national police commissioner Riah Phiyega.
“Reducing crime is not only a police responsibility. There is also an important role for other government departments such as health, education and social development,” Newham added.
For total sexual crimes, Phiyega announced a decrease of 0.4% in the past year.
But the raw statistics show an increase in cases from 64 514 in the year between April 2011 to March 2012 to 66 387 for the same period this year. This is 1 873 cases more, an increase of 2.9% on last year.
According to Phiyega common robbery decreased 2.2%, but the stats show an increase of 1% and of robberies at business premises.
Phiyega said there was a decrease of 0.6%, but the figures show an increase of 2.7%.
Though she said crime overall decreased this year, crimes such as murder, attempted murder, armed robbery, car and truck hijackings, and house and business robberies all increased.
Phiyega admitted these types of crimes posed a problem.
“Yes, there are several challenges but we committing ourselves to reversing and dealing with these,” she said.
The Springs SAPS was contacted for local crime statistics but these had not been sent through at the time of going to press, these had not been made available to the Addie.
However, according to www.crimestatssa.com, crime in Gauteng accounts for 27% of the country’s crime, and Springs features as one of the 10 worst precincts in at least five crime categories.
These are as follows:
- Arson – 28 cases putting the town in fourth position, beaten only by Mamelodi East, Akasia and Tembisa.
- Burgalary at a non-residential property – 376 making Springs the town with the third highest number of these.
- Carjacking – 104 putting Springs in third position.
- Robbery at a non-residential property – 99 making Springs the town with the fourth highest number of crimes in this category.
- Culpable homicide – 40 putting Springs in seventh position.
