Shocking murder numbers in South Africa – 70 people killed every day

The South African Police Service (SAPS) and Stats SA have finally published the latest official crime statistics for the country, covering the final quarter of 2023/24 (January to March 2024) and the first quarter of 2024/25 (April to June 2024).

The late publishing of the statistics has left a glaring hole in South Africa’s crime coverage, with the public being without any insight into crime trends for six months.

The crime stats for Q4 2023/24 were supposed to be published in May, but they were a no-show ahead of the 2024 national elections.

However, there are now two-quarters of data to digest—though it must be noted that any crime trends in the Q4 data will be lagging.

However, looking at both quarters combined, some insight into crime in the first half of 2024 can be gleaned, as the data covers January to June.

Notably, this combined data shows that 12,734 people were murdered in this period—averaging 70 murders a day over the 182 days.

6,536 people were murdered between January and March, and 6,198 were murdered between April and June.

Year-on-year, this is worse than the same period in 2023, where 12,517 were murdered (217 more murders were recorded in 2024).

While the latest Victim of Crime Survey published by Stats SA this week shows that many crimes go unreported in South Africa, murder is one crime that almost always gets processed by the SAPS, thus reflecting the true state of violence in the country.

Worryingly, the survey points to a massive increase in murders—approximately 22,000 in the past 12 months, an increase of 38% from 16,000 murders at the time of the previous survey.

Against the latest population estimates, this translates to a murder rate of 21 per 100,000 people for the first six months of the year—a figure which will undoubtedly climb as the full annual dataset is compiled.

Provincially, the Eastern Cape remained the worst region for murders in South Africa, with a murder rate of 17.4 and 17.6 per 100,000 over 24Q4 and 25Q1, respectively.

This is followed by the Western Cape, which has reclaimed the second-place dishonour from KwaZulu Natal, which dropped to third.

Provincial murder rates Q4 2023/24

Provincial murder rates Q1 2024/25

Looking at the combined data for the first half of the 2024 calendar year, the same trend emerges.

Read: Crime surges in South Africa – with murder, assault and vandalism getting worse