In 1976 the South African police killed 653 people.
According to research by David Bruce of the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR), the 2008/2009 figure for deaths in police custody is not far behind that of 1976.
In the last year 556 suspects, including 32 innocent bystanders, were shot and killed.
In 1976 violence erupted in Soweto when the then minister of education, Andries Treurnicht sought to compel black students to take certain subjects in Afrikaans. The riots spread nationally. The government deployed riot police and the army far and wide.
Some put the number of deaths during the riots at 332 in Soweto, and more than 435 nationally. Only a few years in apartheid history were more violent. 1984 and 1985 being two of them.
This means that another 220 people were killed in 1976 by the police, besides in the riots, and presumably at least some of these deaths were as a result of politics.
In other words a maximum of 220 people were killed that were considered ordinary ‘suspects’.
The police are killing an awful number of people for a country at peace.
HOWEVER – Deaths during ‘police contact’ in the UK routinely hover around 100. A lot less than SA yes, but look again.
The UK overall homicide rate is around 1000 a year. Police ‘deaths’ therefore represent nearly 10% of the total. In South Africa police ‘killings’ have a ratio of 550 to 17,000. Ie, just over 3%.
And in Rio alone, deaths from police contact rise to 1000 per year.
Related deployments:
Its an awful number of people killed by police or a country at peace – thats totally correct.
I must admit that i’m not sure whether the numbers of people killed during the struggle against apartheid are correct, because the apartheid regime changed its pattern from detaining activists to more often letting people “disappear” – so there is a unknown number of people whos fate is unknown until today.
But the current numbers and incedents are a big scandal for a nation that could have been a role model for successful transition from autocratic rule to peaceful democracy.
Its obvious that the demands of the majority of people hasnt been met yet.
Hi Con Cerned, nope, unlike Argentina and Chile the apartheid state did not have a strategy of mass disappearances.
Even Stanza Bopape was known to have been arrested by police – if my memory serves me correct.
There were death squads true. But most people were either killed in riots like Soweto 76, or in ANC Inkatha clashes in the 90′s.
In all the TRC claimed there were 24,000 deaths on all sides from 48 to 93. That figure is too low. But by only by a couple of thousand.
here we are talking of disloyal and unpatriotic police who are unleashed against the public and of course corrupted.
a com[pletely lawless and unconstitutional police that is also heavily glued to the underworld!people have died in large numbers as i remember that in the early nineties there used to be a corpse/s coming out of a former satellite police station in small street mall.they were killed inside then pushed down the stairway and we are told he was trying to escape.plaintiffs are treated like defendants and if they complain they`re sent to the icu,institution or mortuary.