Where South Africa’s illegal guns come from

According to South Africa’s Acting Minister of Police, Firoz Cachalia, most of the country’s illicit firearms are smuggled in from neighbouring countries after being diverted from legal markets.

This was revealed in a response to a written question from MK Party Member of Parliament Crossby Shongwe.

“The increase in illicit firearms entering the Republic is primarily caused by diversion from legal markets, through theft, fraud, straw purchases, cross-border trafficking, and illicit manufacturing,” he said.

Cachalia added that these are driven by underlying factors such as high demand from criminal groups, weak regulatory frameworks, and corruption.

“Firearms are mainly smuggled from Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Eswatini, and Lesotho. In a sense, criminal syndicates are exploiting porous borders and informal crossings,” the minister said.

“Concealment methods used include bulk carriers, using land (vehicles), air (cargo), and sea (containers) routes. Corruption within law enforcement agencies, in this instance SAPS, leads to the non-detection of concealed firearms.”

The minister added that these weapons are then smuggled inland to commit violent crimes and facilitate crimes such as illegal mining, armed robberies, murders, kidnapping, vehicle robberies, cash-in-transit heists, and other gang-related activities.

However, the finger can also be pointed at the police for negligence when handling their firearms, something Cachalia did not highlight.

In November, the acting minister informed an MP that 4,124 SAPS-owned firearms had been reported as lost or stolen since 2020.

However, after 2020, no active SAPS members have been linked to participating in the supply of SAPS-owned firearms to organised criminal networks.

Cachalia said the SA Police has committed to compiling a full report by 31 December 2025, for submission by 15 January 2026, on the issue.

At the end of 2024, the late Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime researcher Jenni Irish-Qhobosheane stated that research revealed the loss of 18,000 firearms between 2003 and 2013.

Similarly, City Press reported that between 2005 and 2017, 26,025 firearms issued to police officers had been lost or stolen.

However, according to Irish-Qhobosheane, the overall figure for firearms the government has lost or had stolen is significantly higher, as only the police report their firearms losses to the Central Firearms Registry.

21,700 seized in five years

Despite the increasing number of illicit firearms entering the country, SAPS is having some success in cracking down on the issue.

According to Cachalia, police have confiscated 21,700 illegal firearms over the past five years.

The most significant portion of these illegal firearms was confiscated in the Western Cape, totalling 6,267 for the period. Seven hundred and forty-one of these weapons were reported to have been used in murders.

Gang-inflicted areas of the Western Cape, especially those such as the Cape Flats in Cape Town, are a hotspot for the trade and use of illegal weapons.

The Western Cape was followed by KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, with 4,297 and 4,248 confiscated in each province, respectively.

Like Cape Town, KZN also sees its fair share of gangsterism, with provincial police reportedly seizing 346 illegal firearms and 3,192 rounds of ammunition in January this year.

Gauteng has had several major illegal weapon busts, with cops arresting two individuals at the end of July outside Alberton for transporting unlicensed firearms.

The suspects were found with 30 unlicensed 9mm firearms which, upon further investigation, were en route to the Western Cape, according to the police report.

Other provinces saw significantly fewer firearms confiscated. However, this does not necessarily indicate that there is less illegal firearm-related crime in these regions.

Two thousand six hundred and six weapons were seized in the Eastern Cape, 1,243 in Mpumalanga, 1,070 in Limpopo, 949 in North West, 873 in the Free State, and 149 in the Northern Cape.

Of all the provinces, Mpumalanga had the highest rate of firearms used in murder cases at 53%, followed by KZN and the Northern Cape.