Civil society groups slam Cele for wanting to disarm legal gun owners

Civil society groups have slammed Police Minister Bheki Cele for wanting to disarm legal gun owners after he said that only police officers and soldiers should be allowed to legally own firearms.

Cele said this week in parliament a draft firearms control amendment Bill was in the pipeline, which would not allow the general population to own firearms.

But according to Gun Owners South Africa (Gosa), the proposal by the minister is misguided and will leave millions of people vulnerable if their firearms are taken away.

“The number of crimes committed by licensed firearm owners is statistically insignificant compared to those committed by criminals using illegal firearms,” said Gosa chairperson Paul Oxley yesterday.

He said by targeting law-abiding citizens to hand over their guns was not the right strategy and Cele should rather focus on getting back illegal firearms that were used to commit crimes.

“If police cannot protect people, which they have demonstrated, what does the minister expect them to do?” asked Oxley.

According to a response to a parliamentary question posed to the minister last year, there were 9.5 million rounds of ammunition and 4,357 firearms lost in the South African Police Service over the past six years.

Responding to Cele’s statement, another civil society group, Safe Citizen Campaign, said his comments were callous and filled with disregard for the brutal and violent crime faced by ordinary people every day.

“In September 2018 minister Cele told parliament that we are living in a war zone but we are not at war. Since that date, violent crime has escalated in South Africa and we are challenged to imagine how Cele expects ordinary citizens to defend themselves against violent crime,” said Jonathan Deal, the interim spokesperson for the campaign.

He said that even in countries that had the best-equipped police force and low crime rates, people still had to rely on their own protection in life-threatening situations.

“There is no time to dial 10111 and wait for help. A licensed firearm is the only tool that can provide an ordinary person with an opportunity to survive such an attack,” said Deal.

– gcinan@citizen.co.za

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