The cost in human suffering, from grief and loss, in respect of murderous crime in South Africa, is incalculable.
The recent shocking murder wave in Ekurhuleni, where the bodies of nine women were discovered, has again shone a spotlight on SA’s “epidemic of violence against women” as the Financial Times noted. Although there has been a slight reduction in the annual murder rate, with SAPS recording 25,573 murders in 2024/205, the equation of 40-41 murders per 100 000 people per year, around seven times the world average according to World Bank Open Data.
However, what can be calculated is the economic cost of unchecked criminality in our country.
President Ramaphosa himself advised Parliament earlier this year that organised crime as “the most immediate threat to our democracy, our society and to our economic development.”
To his credit, Ramaphosa appointed the Madlanga Commission to investigate the extraordinary collusion between gangs, illegal businesses and the police. The Economist with a cover story last week on “State and Mafia in South Africa” recorded that “by one estimate, SA is the seventh most vulnerable country in the world to mafia predation.”
Business leaders also state that these illegal activities “worry them more than any other issue, even power cuts.”
The World Bank estimates that crime costs our country at least 10% of GDP per year “in stolen property, high security and insurance costs and missed economic opportunities.”
Former SARS head, Edward Kieswetter, estimates the size of illicit business (from cigarettes to alcohol and mining) has mushroomed in two decades from 5% of GDP to between 12% and 15% of GDP this year, and that illicit firms cost the state around R300 billion annually in uncollected taxes, “enough to fund the health budget.”
Beyond noting these grim statistics, what is to be done?
The Madlanga Commission provides a golden and rare opportunity to clear out the rot in the criminal justice system, exactly as other mafia-challenged countries have done. However, its final report and recommendations are only likely to be released in the first half of next year.
The collaboration between business and government under the Operation Vulindlela has highlighted crime and corruption as structural constraints on economic growth and investor confidence.
The appointment of former top NPA official Anton du Plessis as head of Business Against Crime has reinvigorated this important body.
We also need to learn from past mistakes, the most glaring and baleful being the disbandment of the Scorpions (a multi-agency effort that proved too successful when it investigated Jacob Zuma). There is a direct link between its abolition and the state capture embedded in his presidency.
There is no shortage of ideas and commitment here, as well as comparative global examples to effectively bust the gangs and fix the illicit economy.
But reforms paving the way for better policing and effective prosecution and crime interdiction needs to be done at scale and with urgency. And the scourge of political meddling needs to be quarantined from law enforcement.
The alternative is state and economic destruction, and the people who live with the daily reality of crime giving up on constitutional democracy (note the rise of vigilante action, for example).
That endpoint must at all costs be avoided.
– Tony Leon
Chairman