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The RULE of the GUN Hits and Assassinations in South Africa January 2000 to December 2017 the Rule of the Gun Assassination Witness

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The RULE of the GUN Hits and Assassinations in South Africa January 2000 to December 2017 the Rule of the Gun Assassination Witness THE RULE OF THE GUN Hits and Assassinations in South Africa January 2000 to December 2017 The rule of the gun Assassination Witness About the Report This report is a product of a project called Assassination Witness, a collaboration between the Centre for Criminology at the University of Cape Town and the Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime (GITOC). The report was authored by Kim Thomas with the assistance of Azwi Netshikulwe and Ncedo Mngqibisa. To find out more about the work of Assassination Witness, seewww.assassination witness.org.za and for daily tweeting on hits in South Africa, follow us on Twitter at @AssassinationZA. Publication date: March 2018 Acknowledgements I would in particular like to thank Azwi Netshikulwe and Ncedo Mngqibisa for their fieldwork in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, Julie Berg for managing the project from the Centre of Criminology at the University of Cape Town, and Lameez Mota and Liesel Collins for their assistance in administrating the project. Guy Lamb and Elrena van der Spuy provided valuable comments on an earlier version of the report. I am grateful to Mark Ronan for editing the report. Lastly, I would like to thank Mark Shaw for his invaluable input, direction and support, without which this project would not have been possible. International IDEA partnered with us by providing software that was used to map the impact of assassinations on democracy at the local level. Corruption Watch supplied us with data that was used to establish whether there is a relationship between corruption and assassinations. We would like to acknowledge the funders of this project, the Open Society Foundation of South Africa, the Government of Norway and the National Research Foundation of South Africa. 1 The rule of the gun Assassination Witness Summary This report presents an analysis of criminal market, notably South Africa’s data on hits (contract killings) carried notoriously violent taxi industry, which out in South Africa. The data has provides a recruitment pool where been compiled as part of the work of hitmen can be hired. The findings a collaborative project, Assassination of this report aim to inform a more Witness. The data that informs the effective policy response to the report spans the period from 2000 to phenomenon of contract killings in 2017 and the findings allow certain South Africa in order that more can be conclusions to be drawn about the done about it. evolving nature of the phenomenon of paid-for assassinations. Various international studies provided the terminology, framework and The targeted killing of people – a form background to understanding how of organized crime that escalated and why contract killings become rapidly towards the end of the data prevalent. But these analyses period – has a highly detrimental are largely focused on developed impact on South Africa’s ongoing countries.1 democratic project and often fragile governance systems. The study It is important to note that the South found that a large proportion of African context, as is the case with assassinations in South Africa are other developing countries, is different contracted for political, economic or from that of the Global North. In South social gain, and that commissioned Africa, the sheer number of hits is killings also targeted professionals greater, the urgency of collecting the in the country’s criminal-justice data more apparent and the need to system. There are segments of the act more pressing. economy that nurture and feed this Key recommendations • Improve firearm control to reduce the flow of illicit arms. • Focus on reducing violent competition within the taxi industry. • Erode the ‘nurseries of violence’ that provide a supply of hitmen for hire. • Bolster prosecution-led investigations. • Expand efforts at monitoring assassinations and disaggregate homicide data, so that better-quality statistics on contract killings are made available. 2 The rule of the gun Assassination Witness Introduction Sindiso Magaqa rose to prominence as person killed for gain, monetary or one of Julius Malema’s key allies after otherwise. An event begins with the being elected as secretary general initial exploration of the possibility of of the ANC Youth League in 2011. At having someone killed, and terminates the time of his death, he was an ANC with a murder, attempted murder, or councillor and executive committee police intervention.’2 When describing member for the Umzimkhulu the phenomenon, we use both the municipality. He was lauded as having term ‘hit’ – which is widely used in the potential for a bright political South African popular discourse – and future. One evening in July 2017, ‘assassination’. In terms of South Magaqa and two other ANC councillors African law, making use of a third party pulled over at a shop in the village of to commit a murder is no different Umzimkhulu on their way back from from committing the murder oneself.3 SINDISO MAGAQA an ANC meeting. Moments later, they were ambushed by gunmen who fired The cost of hits can be felt in many 4 September 2017 a hail of bullets at them. All three ways. But, generally, the goals of an Umizimkhulu, were rushed to hospital for medical open, prosperous and democratic Kwa Zulu Natal attention. On 4 September 2017, society are severely thwarted Magaqa died from his injuries, making when people are killed for political, him the fourth councillor to be killed in economic, criminal and social gain. the area in 2017. This report aims to quantify the problem of killings by paid hitmen Magaqa is only one of the many in South Africa, to examine why the victims of assassinations in South rate of contract killings has risen so Africa, few of which receive the sharply in recent years and to build coverage in the media that his death the evidence base that can provide a did. In several cases, the victims of platform for a call to action. hits had been whistle-blowers or civic activists who had stood up for the Targeted assassinations have resulted truth or who had wished to serve their in the deaths of many citizens, but, communities. For this, they paid the among the victims, there is a notable ultimate price. proportion who had been politicians, whistle-blowers, proprietors of taxi According to the data used for this businesses (known colloquially as study, there were 159 reported ‘taxi bosses’) and members of the assassinations in South Africa in legal fraternity. The impact of these 2017– a figure that was up by 36% assassinations is far-reaching, as they from 2016 (when 117 hits were undermine South Africa’s democracy recorded) and up by 346% from 2012 and judiciary, and threaten fair (46 hits). From these numbers, it is economic competition – suggesting clear that assassinations are a rapidly they are used to exert a mafia-type growing problem in South Africa. As control over society. But the effect the analysis in this report will show, is felt not only by institutions – a hit there was a particularly dramatic is also a human tragedy, and has an increase in reported cases between overwhelming impact on the victim’s 2014 and the end of 2017. family and community. The killing of breadwinners is economically A contract hit, or assassination, devastating for dependants. can be defined as ‘a continuous sequence of interactions by one or Yet despite their impact, the scale more persons in which one person and scope of assassinations in South solicits another person to have a third Africa have not been monitored 3 The rule of the gun Assassination Witness or analyzed, and the current In the personal category, we included understanding of assassinations cases that involved infidelity or – and the response to them – is perceived infidelity (love triangles), poor. For example, there are no attempts to obtain life-insurance disaggregated police statistics for pay-outs and several cases of contract killings. The South African children arranging for their parents Police Service releases statistics to be killed. Finally, we included a on homicides – but not types of category for South Africa’s minibus- homicides. Therefore, to collate the taxi industry, partly because of the figures for this study we drew on the sheer number of murder cases in resources of a database covering this industry, and because it is an local, regional and national news. The industry segment that has long been information from the database was characterized by the prevalence of then supplemented with detailed targeted killings. These include hits searches of internet news stories. targeting taxi bosses, taxi drivers and members of taxi association The time frame for the search was committees. Such murders are usually 2000 to 2017. This intensive work connected to disputes over route generated a sample of over 16 000 allocations and power struggles Political conflict, media articles, which were then within the lucrative taxi associations. poor governance reviewed to identify specific cases where the police, family or media Analysis of the data revealed two and political indicated that the victim had been alarming trends. First, there was a the subject of an alleged hit. These marked increase in the total number uncertainty cases were then coded for analysis of assassinations carried out in South according to their details, including Africa since 2012. It also shows that contributed to the name and gender of the victim, this significant upswing through the date and location of the incident, to the end of 2017 was driven by an increase in the method used to conduct the increases in all the categories of murder, the outcome and any other assassinations mentioned above. the numbers of relevant circumstances surrounding It is perhaps not surprising that the hit. We included in the database political conflict, poor governance assassinations not only hits where the target was and political uncertainty, for example, actually killed, but also assassination which defined the South African that fall into the attempts that failed (i.e.
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