141 hits in SA last year
MORE than 141 assassinations took place in South Africa in 2022.
Rumbidzai Matamba, a crime expert for the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, said over the last two decades in South Africa, violence had become a commodity that could be bought and sold.
He recently completed a report titled “The Business of Killings, Assassinations in South Africa”, which recorded the shocking statistics.
“Assassinations, also referred to as contract or targeted killings, commissioned for economic, political or personal gain, are one part of this broader commercial market for organised violence and intimidation.
“Although such targeted killings constitute a small proportion of the country’s extraordinarily high murder rate, they have a powerful, resonating impact, in that they send out an unequivocal threatening message to the victims’ communities, colleagues and families.”
Matamba said professional hit men were in high demand in the taxi industry and organised crime markets, and they were also contracted by politicians and business people to remove rivals and threats.
“The hired assassins or hit men involved in this market are often recruited from certain segments of South Africa’s criminal underworld, including armed gangs in the Western Cape and the minibus-taxi industry, particularly in KZN and the Eastern
Cape. And in some cases, perpetrators are hired from law enforcement agencies. These environments provide a ready supply of the hit men and firearms needed to make the market for contract killings viable
“Between 2021 and 2022, the trend of targeted killings was mixed, with some categories increasing while others decreased. In the sphere of politics, positions for local municipal office are highly contested for economic and personal reasons, and targeted killings have increasingly become a common phenomenon of the South African political economy.”
Matamba said there was some level of government recognition and intervention, in the form of commissions of inquiry or police task forces.
He said firearm control needed to be looked at.
“Greater access to firearms has increased violence and led to a commercialisation of violence-for-hire. There is also a need for more robust intelligence gathering and more professional police investigations into threats of violence and targeted killings.”
Matamba said intelligence gathering and investigative capabilities had been crippled by years of mismanagement by the police, political interference, deep-seated corruption and the lack of specialist skills.
He said there was also an urgent need for specialised intelligence personnel and properly trained police with resources, to conduct thorough investigations followed through with arrests.