Top gun: Three SA cities now rank among world’s 20 most violent

You may be forgiven for thinking violence has become a way of life in South Africa after no less than three major cities feature among the top 20 most violent cities in the world, according to the latest Mexican Council for Public Security and Criminal Justice’s notorious annual report.  

Since 2013, the council ranks the 50 most violent cities in the world based on the number of murders per 100,000 people.

SA a regular feature in rankings of world’s 50 most violent cities

The list includes cities with a population of more than 300,000 and doesn’t count deaths in combat zones or cities with unavailable murder statistics.

The overall top 50 is dominated by South American countries, although it also includes New Orleans in the United States, Haiti and Jamaica. South African cities have been a regular feature since the very first report.

In the 2022/23 ranking, four of our country’s cities appeared in the top 50.

Three SA cities now in top-20 ranks

This year, however, Cape Town, Durban and Nelson Mandela Bay (Gqeberha) have “moved up” the rankings to make the top-20 cut.

Cape Town, marred by gang violence, beats the two other cities by taking 12th spot, cosying up with Brazil’s Mossoro (11th) and Mexico’s Irapuata (13th).

The rise of violence in Durban has pushed the city into 15th place – ahead of Nelson Mandela Bay (ranked 16th) – to boast the unenviable bragging rights as South Africa’s second-most violent city.

Unsurprisingly, Johannesburg also makes the top 50, ranked 34th in the world.

Cape Town the ‘most murderous city’

While South Africa is not featured in the top 10 rankings with Mexico’s Colima claiming the No 1 position, Cape Town ranks first in terms of the sheer number of murders, recording 2,998 deaths, with Johannesburg and Durban following closely behind.

In fact, only five cities recorded over 2,000 murders – and South Africa accounts for three of them.

1. Cape Town: 2,998
2. Johannesburg: 2,547
3. Durban: 2,405
4. Tijuana (Mexico): 2,177
5. Salvador (Brazil): 2,085

According to the rankings, Cape Town’s 2,998 murders among its population of 4.76 million people gives the city a murder rate of 63 per 100,000.

Durban’s murder rate has rocketed from 40 per 100,000 in 2021/22 to 59.4 per 100,000 in 2022/23.

According to BusinessTech, this could be attributed to the spate of political killings and mass shootings over the past year in the city and the KwaZulu-Natal province.

Despite being toppled from its previous position, the so-called “Friendly City”, Nelson Mandela Bay (Gqeberha) has also seen its murder rate climb to 57 per 100,000.

Having earned a global reputation throughout the years for being one of the most dangerous cities in the world, Johannesburg surprisingly has the lowest murder rate (41.1 – up from last year’s 30.8) among the South African cities ranked.

Murder rates in SA

It’s clear from the data, which has been tracking murder rates over the last 10 years, that South Africa has become an increasingly violent country to reside in, with all four featured cities steadily climbing the overall rankings.

SA has all the makings for elevated violence

But then again, according to Business Insider, the featured Latin American countries have earned their stripes for the region’s elevated violence due to drug trafficking, gang wars, political instability, corruption and poverty.

And as a country, we tick all those boxes…

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