According to American television on October 2nd, even in a country with one of the highest murder rates in the world , the scale of the killings occurring in such a short period of time is shocking. Experts attribute the two main causes to organized crime and the easy access to illegal firearms.
Julian Rademeyer, an advisor to the Global Initiative to Combat Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC), stated: "South Africa is awash in guns."
This was clearly demonstrated by the shell casings scattered on the ground after eight gunmen armed with AK-47 rifles and handguns opened fire at a pub in Wedela, in western Johannesburg, on the evening of September 27, killing 18 people. Hours later, another 10 people were killed in a shooting in Lwandle, near Cape Town.
According to Stanley Maphosa, CEO of the non-profit Gun Free South Africa, weapons are a critical factor. He says that easy access to firearms can turn conflicts involving organized crime, extortion, gangs, revenge killings, taxi-related violence, or personal disputes into deadly attacks.
Murder rate in South Africa
Official police figures show that the homicide rate in South Africa has fallen to 41 per 100,000 inhabitants in the 12 months to March 31, 2025, compared to 44.7 per 100,000 inhabitants the previous year. The downward trend continues, with homicide numbers in both the January-March and April-June periods of this year being lower than the same periods of the previous year.
Acting Police Minister Firoz Cachalia suggested that recent measures, including targeted raids and increased coordination between agencies, may be working, while warning that further research is needed to understand the reasons for the decrease in homicides.
It is noteworthy that the frequency of mass murders has increased even as the total number of homicides has decreased. Rademeyer argues that such attacks are not a new phenomenon, but appear to be on the rise.
The attacks have also fueled concerns in some communities about the risk of further violence. Residents living near the pub in West Johannesburg fear further attacks. Some say they no longer feel safe going about their daily lives.
GI-TOC recorded 45 mass killings in South Africa between January 1 and September 28 this year, resulting in at least 210 deaths and 79 injuries.
The GI-TOC defines mass murder as an attack in which at least three people are intentionally killed. Four of the five shootings last month met this definition.
GI-TOC recorded one mass murder in January and one in February. By June, the number of incidents each month had risen to eight, and August and September also recorded eight incidents. The attacks in September alone resulted in 57 deaths.
According to Rademeyer, GI-TOC lacks reliable comparative data for 2025. He stated that the organization is tracking 17 mass murders in 2025, but cautioned that this is an underestimation of the actual number because GI-TOC only began monitoring these cases this year and will increase data collection later.
The causes of numerous mass murders.
There is no single cause. Rademeyer suggests that mass killings occur across multiple criminal domains, including illegal mining, extortion, gang activity, and disputes over minibus routes. He argues that organized crime accounts for only a fraction of gun-related deaths but is linked to some of the deadliest attacks.
In February, President Cyril Ramaphosa declared organized crime the most pressing threat to South Africa's democracy, society, and economic development. He announced the deployment of soldiers to assist police in combating gang violence.
There is no indication that the five most recent shootings, including two in the Cape Town area and one in the southern city of Durban, are related. Investigators are considering a variety of motives, including conflicts between criminal groups, retaliation, and business disputes.
The shooting at a Johannesburg pub last weekend was the deadliest of the five incidents. Police are investigating the possibility that the incident was related to a territorial dispute over illegal mining operations or was retaliation for a previous shooting at the same pub.
Illegal mining has fueled violence in the area surrounding Johannesburg for years. Illegal miners, often referred to locally as “zama zamas,” operate abandoned gold mines, while rival groups vie for control of the operation. In the Wedela area, criminal gangs run the mining operations and employ gunmen to protect their territory.
The origin of firearms
GI-TOC has documented arms trafficking from neighboring Namibia into South Africa, where the weapons are then delivered to gangs and armed robbers who participate in cash robberies during transit.
Mr. Maphosa argued that illegal firearms could also include guns lost or stolen by citizens and government agencies, as well as guns linked to corruption and cross-border smuggling. He stated, "An AK-47 doesn't just appear in a bar. Behind the gun and ammunition is an entire supply chain."
According to figures, South Africa has approximately 63,500 licensed civilian firearms that were reported lost or stolen between 2013 and 2023.
Police figures show that since April 2022, 2,346 police firearms have been stolen and another 177 have gone missing, along with 194,920 rounds of ammunition.
Former police colonel Christiaan Prinsloo was convicted in 2016 after stealing more than 2,000 guns from police caches to resell, many of which were sold to gangs. According to local media, 888 of these guns were later forensically examined and found to be linked to 1,066 murders in the Western Cape province.
Reasons why violence is difficult to prevent.
The government 's Vala Umgodi campaign to crack down on illegal mining has resulted in thousands of arrests and the seizure of hundreds of weapons.
However, arresting large numbers of low-level participants will have only limited impact if those who finance and provide resources to these networks remain unpunished.
According to experts, police also need to target those who buy and refine illegal gold, those who finance it, and those who supply weapons.
Police need to trace the origins of seized firearms, address backlogs in ammunition testing, and investigate non-lethal shootings, as these could be warning signs of further violence.
However, tracing the origin of firearms and determining whether they were used in other crimes is a time-consuming task. The head of the ballistics analysis division at the police Forensic Science Laboratory told an investigative committee in 2025 that the unit had a backlog of 41,846 cases and held more than 29,000 firearms related to those cases.
Mr. Maphosa argued that authorities not only need to recover illegal firearms but also focus on preventing these weapons from falling into the hands of criminal networks in the first place. He said, “We are counting the number of guns recovered. We also have to count, track, and prevent the number of guns brought in. The real measure of success is how many people are prevented from becoming victims of gun violence.”
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