A Free State municipality is the latest – unwilling – member of the club to lose firearms to thieves in what is an ongoing crisis – over five years, nearly 3 500 police firearms have been lost or stolen.
Moqhaka Local Municipality, headquartered in Kroonstad, joined the SA Police Service (SAPS) and the SA National Defence Force (SANDF) as government organisations/structures where “a large quantity” of firearms and ammunition were taken from a municipal building.
The SAPS said the theft is believed to have occurred on 1 December in the early hours of the morning, and was discovered the following day by a municipal employee arriving at work who reportedly found the alarm control box damaged. The armoury door had been forced, apparently with an angle grinder and the safes inside cut open.
Preliminary investigations revealed 43 firearms, including 9 mm pistols, revolvers and pump action shotguns, along with around 1 100 rounds of ammunition and six bulletproof vests, had been stolen. Suspects are believed to have gained entry by breaking through a wall near a bathroom area, the SAPS said.
Bemoaning the loss of the 43 weapons, ammunition and bulletproof vests, Councillor Nick Muller (Democratic Alliance) said questions would be asked of the acting municipal manager.
“We demand clarity and also want a full inventory of municipal firearms and ammunition as well as being informed that all licences, permits and firearm registers are up to date,” he said adding competency of staff and security measures would also be sought.
In November Acting Police Minister Firoz Cachalia told a Parliamentarian 4 124 SAPS firearms were either stolen or lost between 2019/20 and the present date. He disputed an assertion by MKP (uMkhonto we Sizwe Party) public representative, Wesley Douglas, that 7 500 State-issued firearms were “now in the hands of criminal syndicates”.
In another Parliamentary reply, to the Democratic Alliance’s Deputy Spokesperson on Police Ian Cameron, Cachalia stated that between the 2019/20 and 2023/24 financial years, 3 213 SAPS firearms were stolen in thefts or robberies, and another 220 lost, for a total of 3 433 for that period. Only 559 were recovered.
“While SAPS lists several internal controls, including stocktaking, inspections, and the use of SABS-compliant safes, the persistent leakage of firearms shows these measures are either ineffective or not being properly implemented. The presence of state-issued firearms in the hands of criminals directly fuels South Africa’s violent crime crisis and demonstrates that state mismanagement not law-abiding gun owners, is the primary source of illegally circulating firearms,” Cameron said.
A SAPS working group, set up by National Commissioner, General Fannie Masemola, is working on a thorough verification process of all SAPS-owned firearms lost/stolen from 2019/2020 on. The report will be ready for submission [presumably to Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Police] by 15 January.
Cachalia, in a Parliamentary reply to the MK Party’s Crossby Shongwe, acknowledged an increase in illicit firearms entering South Africa, primarily caused by diversion from legal markets (through theft, fraud, and straw purchases) across border trafficking and illicit manufacturing, which are all driven by underlying factors such as high demand from criminal groups, weak regulatory frameworks and corruption.
“Firearms are mainly smuggled from Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Eswatini and Lesotho. In a sense criminal syndicates are exploiting porous borders and informal crossings. Firearms are concealed when smuggled making detection thereof difficult. Such concealment methods used include bulk carriers, using land (vehicles) air (cargo) and sea (containers) routes. Corruption within law enforcement agencies, in this instance, SAPS, leads to the non-detection of concealed firearms. Firearms are mainly smuggled to commit violent crimes inland to facilitate crimes such as illegal mining, armed robberies, murders, kidnapping, vehicle robberies, cash-in-transit (CIT) and other gang related activities and organised crime operations,” Cachalia’s reply stated.
