The most dangerous province in South Africa

The release of South Africa’s crime stats for the second quarter of the 2025/26 financial year has revealed that the Western Cape is the most dangerous of the country’s nine provinces.

This is according to the ratio of murders per 100,000 people across the first two quarters of the 2025/26 financial year, from April to September.

While Gauteng recorded the most murders in the country at 2,872, the Western Cape’s 2,308 incidents relative to its population of just over 7 million means the murder rate is 31.26.

Population statistics used were from the Department of Water and Sanitation’s figures from April 2025.

The Eastern Cape recorded the second-highest number of murders per 100,000 people at 30.14.

At the national level, there were 11,564 murders across the two quarters, resulting in a rate of 18.65.

Only the Western Cape and Northern Cape recorded an increase in murders relative to the first quarter.

Similar to the murder statistics, Gauteng has recorded the most contact crimes at 79,412 this year so far.

These include murder, sexual offences, attempted murder, assault with intent to inflict grievous bodily harm, common assault, common robbery, and robbery with aggravating circumstances.

However, it should be noted that crime, especially sexual offences, is largely underreported, meaning that these figures are most likely significantly higher.

The Western Cape’s 54,571 contact crimes yields a ratio of 734 crimes per 100,000 people compared to Gauteng’s 491, the Eastern Cape’s 453, and KwaZulu-Natal’s 433.

The Western Cape and Northern Cape were also the only two provinces to notice an increase in contact crimes in the second quarter of the year.

“I want you to know that I understand and respect your worries about the lack of security,” Chachalia said during the briefing.

“Importantly, we are seeing ongoing and significant reductions in serious and violent crime, but at a high level. Murder has started to decrease significantly… and that is often a very good indicator of crime trends.”

‘Crime stats cannot be taken seriously’

Despite these trends, Freedom Front Plus (VF+) spokesperson on police, Wouter Wessels, said that South Africans should approach the statistics with cautious optimism.

He argued that the statistics released by Cachalia are most likely not the full picture, citing Statistics South Africa’s Victims of Crime Survey that shows massive underreporting of crime, especially sexual offences.

Wessels highlighted a recent report by the Institute for Security Studies, which shows that only 22% of South Africans trust the police.

“Public confidence in the police will undoubtedly plummet further as information is divulged to the Madlanga Commission and the parliamentary ad hoc committee,” Wessels argued.

“The various police divisions face major challenges, particularly due to budget constraints, staff shortages, poor resources, lack of expertise in specialised fields, work overload and low morale.”

Wave of violence in the Western Cape

While the accuracy of the statistics is being called into question, one thing that it does correctly identify is the increase of violent crime, especially murder, in the Western Cape.

In early November, more than 30 people were murdered in the span of a few days in Cape Town, calling into question whether the police have sufficient resources to tackle the ongoing violence.

While the South African Police Service in the province claimed that they had the situation under control, communities begged to differ, with several innocent civilians literally being caught in the crossfire of gang and taxi violence.

In one case, two women were killed and another eight people were injured at a taxi rank in Nyanga after taxi owners were ambushed and shot at.

The victims were seated inside a minibus taxi when the shooting took place and were caught in the crossfire.