Law enforcement fighting tooth and nail to rid Cape Town of crime stigma
CAPE TOWN - Western Cape Community Safety and Police Oversight MEC Anroux Marais says law enforcement agencies in the province are doing all they can to reverse the perception of Cape Town as the country's murder capital.
She was responding to billionaire businessman Johann Rupert's comments at the White House last week. Rupert mentioned the Cape Flats as a place with the highest murder rate, adding that it was experiencing gang warfare.
Despite seeing a drop in murders between January and March this year, the Western Cape is still one of the four provinces with the highest number of murders reported. The Western Cape crime statistics released on Monday show a decrease of 44 murders for the period under review compared to the same period last year. Murders went from 1,112 from January to March 2024, to 1,068 during the same period in 2025. Marais said law enforcement agencies were trying their best to take the numbers even lower. "We do have our Anti-Gang Unit and a strategy that we are looking at. Our LEAP [Law Enforcement Advancement Plan] officers really did fantastic work with SAPS [South African Police Service], and there was a decrease in the crime rate, specifically in some areas."
Gang violence has been identified as the number two reason for the high number of murders in the province.
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