18% decrease in hijackings, thefts in SA over December – Tracker

Tracker released its latest Vehicle Crime Index, which showed an 18% decrease in the number of theft and hijackings in December 2019 as compared to the previous five months in 2019, Cape Argus reported.

Collecting data from its 1.1 million subscriber base, the vehicle tracking company’s statistics gives an accurate and deep understanding into the time of day and days of the week when hijackings and car thefts are most likely to happen in the country.

An 18% and 21% decrease in 2017 and 2018 respectively highlighted a year-on-year trend in the month of December in the reduction of the crimes respectively, according to Tracker.

Since the company’s establishment in 1996, Tracker reached the milestone of recovering 100,000 vehicles in total this month.

The company’s spokesperson, Nandi Canning, said the data showed that Saturday was the day of the week on which most vehicles were hijacked or stolen, followed by Thursday in the case of hijackings, and Friday for regular car theft.

“11am and 2pm are the times where car theft is reported while 8pm and 9pm are times where most hijackings are reported, followed by 12am and 2pm on any day within that week,” Canning said.

Canning said that hijackings in Johannesburg and theft in Pretoria amounted to the 54% of vehicle-related crime that occurred in Gauteng, the highest out of all provinces, followed by KwaZulu-Natal with most hijacking and theft occurring in Durban.

The Western Cape is the third province with Khayelitsha recording the most hijackings and Cape Town with the most car thefts.

“3,081 recoveries, 512 arrests, and 23 firearms were recovered in the second half of 2019 in efforts to fight these crimes,” said Tracker SA executive of operational services Ron Knott-Craig.

Institute for Security Studies researcher Lizette Lancaster commented on the lack of attention on robberies in the streets of South Africa, saying it was “problematic” while indicating that home hijackings and robberies would increase.

For more news your way, download The Citizen’s app for iOS and Android.