• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
Wednesday, May 28, 2025
Reporting South Africa Reporting South Africa
Reporting South Africa Reporting South Africa
  • Featured News
  • Nation
    • Politics
    • Economy
    • Environment
    • Education
  • Art & Culture
    • Food
    • Art
    • Music
    • Fashion
  • Religion
  • Health & Science
    • Public Health
  • Our Student Journalists
    • Spring 2020
      • Ainsley Ash
      • Ayinde Summey
      • Elizabeth Stricklin
      • Laura Peterjohn
      • Renny Simone
      • Skylar Thoma
    • Fall 2019
      • Maggie Connolly
      • Kimberly Wipfler
      • Jamaica Ponder
      • Claudia Stagoff-Belfort
    • Spring 2019
      • Desi LaPoole
      • Kamal Morgan
      • Luke Riley
    • Fall 2018
      • Corey D. Smith
      • Francine Barchett
      • Natalie Elliott
      • Saam Niami Jalinous
    • Spring 2018
      • Kamilah Tom
      • Rebecca Redelmeier
      • Serena Hawkey
        • How circus school saved me from drugs and gangs
      • Hannah Green
      • Madeline Harvey
      • Jacqueline Flynn
    • Fall 2017
      • Mandela Namaste
      • Olivia Decelles
      • Samuel Gohn
      • Aisha Hauser
      • Samantha Tafoya
    • Spring 2017
      • Emily Rizzo
      • Arin Kerstein
      • Alexa Cole
      • Sealy McMurrey
  • Alumni

Police face allegations of murder, abuse as SAPS enforces lockdown

April 4, 2020 By Renny Simone

By Renny Simone

MAIN PHOTO: Police Minister General Bheki Cele and other senior members of the police executive conducted an inspection of lockdown operations in Limpopo yesterday. SOURCE: Twitter @SAPoliceService

Police action is killing South Africans nearly as fast as COVID-19, if allegations reported to the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID) are to be believed.

Complaints received by the police watchdog implicate the South African Police Service (SAPS) in eight deaths since the start of the nationwide lockdown – only one fewer than the number who have died from the virus itself. 

The release of information about the allegations comes after multiple reports of police brutality during the lockdown. At least three police officers are already facing murder charges for the deaths of South African citizens, according to News24. 

IPID is investigating nearly 40 complaints that have been filed since the start of the lockdown on 27 March. 

These include cases of nonfatal police brutality, some of which have been documented and widely shared on social media. One video, posted to YouTube, purports to show a man being beaten for violating the lockdown. Another, appearing to show policemen firing on a group of protesting healthcare workers with flash grenades and rubber bullets, has been retweeted hundreds of times.

This video, apparently circulated by a community activist in Khayelitsha, was uploaded to YouTube by news site GroundUp. It appears to show a man being beaten by a police officer for violating lockdown regulations.
https://twitter.com/Briggar/status/1244908720741666817
This tweet is one of many that include this video of police tossing flash grenades and firing rubber bullets on protesters, apparently at Bongani Regional Hospital in Welkom, Free State.

President Cyril Ramaphosa addressed concerns regarding police violence during a coronavirus update delivered on Monday. “We have made it clear that the task of our security personnel is to support, reassure and comfort our people … they must not cause harm to any of our people,” he said.

But some experts, including Andrew Faull of the Institute for Security Studies in Pretoria, fear that police violence may escalate an already-dangerous situation.

“If on top of their socio-economic hardship citizens routinely experience or perceive abuse by state officials during the lockdown, it is possible that some may rebel,” Faull wrote for Daily Maverick. “[T]he risks posed by continued, illegitimate state violence … could be as great as those brought by the pandemic.”

Others are asking for patience. In an anonymous op-ed published in Daily Maverick, a police officer described the severe stress law enforcement is under during this crisis, urging citizens to cooperate. “[L]ockdown only works if there is compliance,” the officer wrote. 

The effects of the lockdown on police-citizen relations might be clear only in retrospect. Daneel Knoetze, writing for GroundUp, noted that the present rate of complaint submissions to the IPID is in line with pre-lockdown trends, indicating that the problem predated coronavirus. 

But even if the issue of police violence is old news, Knoetze hopes that its increased publicity will have positive effects – such as an increase in funding for the IPID.

“[P]oliticians used the uniqueness of the lockdown moment to call out abuses by the police,” he wrote. “These calls will ring hollow in time, if they do not lead … to policy interventions to hold the transgressors and police management accountable long after the lockdown has ended.”

Renny Simone

Primary Sidebar

PHOTO OF THE DAY

Photo of the Day, 14 February 2020

The Mzamba bridge hangs across Mzamba river in the Eastern Cape. Completed in 2015, the … [Read More...] about Photo of the Day, 14 February 2020

Photo of the Day, 13 February 2020

This painting of a black woman in an upscale restaurant in Durban's Florida Rd shows the stark … [Read More...] about Photo of the Day, 13 February 2020

Photo of the Day, 13 February 2020

An inspirational poster of Nelson Mandela sits alongside two Bibles in the entrance of the iCare … [Read More...] about Photo of the Day, 13 February 2020

Photo of the Day, 12 February 2020

A pile of quarried lime in one of multiple informal markets located at Warwick Junction, Durban, … [Read More...] about Photo of the Day, 12 February 2020

Photo of the Day, 11 February 2020

Buses arrive at the transportation port near Warwick Juncture. Commuters arriving at this bus and … [Read More...] about Photo of the Day, 11 February 2020

Photo of the Day, 10 February 2020

Traders have their wares on display at the Warwick Junction Markets. With thousands of informal … [Read More...] about Photo of the Day, 10 February 2020

The Program

Reporting South Africa is produced by US college and university students on an SIT Study Abroad program called “South Africa: Social and Political Transformation”. They are mentored by veteran journalists in a program applying technology and global consciousness to produce high-impact journalism on vital social issues.

Reporting South Africa strives to be a reliable resource for news and information about South Africa.

Learn More

SIT Logo

A pioneer in experiential, field-based study abroad, SIT (founded as the School for International Training) provides more than 60 semester and summer programs for undergraduate students in Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East, as well as comparative programs in multiple locations.

South Africa: Social and Political Transformation is a program of SIT Study Abroad.

FOLLOW REPORTING SOUTH AFRICA

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • The World Learning Inc. Family:
  • experiment.org
  • https://studyabroad.sit.edu
  • worldlearning.org

Footer

  • Academics
  • Admissions
  • Apply
  • Alumni
  • Alumni Connect
  • Give
  • Media Center
  • Request Info
  • SIT Stories
  • School for International Training

    1 Kipling Road • Brattleboro, VT 05302 • 802 257-7751 • 800 257-7751 (toll-free in the US)
    SIT is a private nonprofit institution of higher education.

  • Explore SIT Graduate Institute

    © Copyright World Learning, Inc.