PRETORIA - Cape Town and Gqeberha have been flagged as areas with extraordinarily high murder rates.
This was revealed by crime analyst Dr Mark Shaw, who appeared before the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry on Wednesday.
He was testifying on how South Africa can strengthen its laws and institutions to prevent organised crime from infiltrating the criminal justice system.
According to Shaw, murder rates spike in areas controlled by violent, territorial gangs.
“We also see pronounced levels of violence present in localities assessed to have a high street gang presence. I think you could actually say a high presence of organised crime like, uh, Gqeberha and Cape Town,” Shaw said.
Shaw continued to paint a grim picture of the country's crime rate.
He said South Africa has one of the highest levels of organised crime outside Latin America.
“One of the most important findings of the index is that democracies are more resilient to organised crime, and that is also the context here in South Africa. South Africa has a relatively high level of resilience as measured by the organised crime index,”