The DA has consistently warned that the Eastern Cape’s crime crisis cannot be solved through reactive policing alone. The province needs a permanent 24-hour Joint Operations Centre in Nelson Mandela Bay, increased capacity for crime intelligence and specialised units, investment in crime-fighting technology, stronger detective services, and station-level accountability in every murder hotspot.
This follows the latest national crime statistics confirming that the Eastern Cape remains South Africa’s murder and rape capital, despite slight decreases in several serious crime categories.
For the fourth quarter, covering January to March 2026, the Eastern Cape recorded the highest murder ratio in the country at 14.3 murders per 100,000 people. The province also recorded the highest rape ratio at 22.5 rapes per 100,000 people.
This means that Eastern Cape residents are still more likely to be murdered or raped than residents anywhere else in South Africa.
A total of 949 murders were recorded in the province over just three months. While this is down from 1,020 during the same period last year, it still means that more than ten people were murdered every day in the Eastern Cape.
The province also recorded 1,853 sexual offences, 524 attempted murders, 6,026 cases of assault with intent to inflict grievous bodily harm, and 4,046 common assaults.
The station-level figures show how deeply entrenched the crisis remains. Kwazakhele is ranked first in South Africa for murder, with 59 murders recorded in just three months. New Brighton, Walmer, Kwanobuhle, and Mthatha also appear among the national top 20 murder stations.
Families are living with gunfire, gang violence, violent robberies, and the daily fear that SAPS will arrive only after another life has been lost.
After eight years of the Ramaphosa presidency, South Africa’s violent crime crisis has not been brought under control. In the Eastern Cape, that failure is measured in murder hotspots, under-resourced stations, weakened detective services, and communities left exposed to organised and violent crime.
I have already secured parliamentary scrutiny of the Northern Areas crime crisis through a DA petition that I presented to the Portfolio Committee on Police to hear the matter last year. That process resulted in a committee report being adopted, but its recommendations have still not been implemented, leaving communities without the resources for SAPS, including in their specialised policing units and crime intelligence, as well as surveillance technology, and coordinated interventions needed to disrupt violent and organised crime.
I will write to the Eastern Cape Provincial Commissioner, Lieutenant General Vuyisile Ncata, and the MEC for Community Safety, Xolile Nqatha, to request a detailed intervention plan for the province’s worst-affected stations, including Kwazakhele, New Brighton, Walmer, Kwanobuhle, and Mthatha.
This plan must set out how SAPS resources are being deployed, what specialised operations are being implemented, how detective capacity is being strengthened, and what measurable targets have been set to reduce murder, rape, and violent assault in the province.
The DA will now also be mobilising the largest march ever held in the Eastern Cape to demand action against the violent crime in our province, because we can’t continue like this.
The DA’s SAPS Amendment Bill would help address this failure by giving capable provincial and local governments a stronger role in the fight against crime where national policing has fallen short.
Crime must be at the top of the agenda.
Eastern Cape residents need police stations that can respond when they call, investigate cases properly, and prevent violent criminals from returning to the same communities again and again.