At least 27 people are dead after two mass shootings in South Africa — a country with some of the world's strictest gun laws and one of its highest murder rates.
The attacks hit a tavern southwest of Johannesburg and a grilled-meat venue near Cape Town on Saturday night. Armed with AK-47s and pistols — weapons already illegal for civilian ownership — the gunmen faced victims who by law had no means to shoot back. Twenty-six more people were wounded.
In Wedela township, eight suspects opened fire on patrons outside a bar, then entered and kept shooting. "It is alleged that patrons were drinking inside and outside the tavern when the suspects arrived and opened fire on those outside," police spokesperson Capt. Tintswalo Sibeko said, according to The Guardian. "The suspects then entered the tavern and continued shooting at patrons inside." The suspects robbed some patrons of their cellphones before fleeing in two vehicles. Seventeen died at the scene — 13 men and four women, the New York Post reported. Fifteen were hospitalized.
Near Cape Town, gunmen entered a shisanyama venue around 1:46 a.m. and opened fire on customers. Five died at the scene; five more died after being transported to medical facilities. Eleven others are receiving treatment. No arrests have been made in either attack.
These massacres come just days after a separate mass shooting at a house party near Durban killed 11 people, including a pregnant woman. No arrests there, either.
South Africa recorded more than 22,700 murders in the 12 months ending June 30 — over 60 per day on average, according to police data cited by The Guardian and CBS News. The country's Firearms Control Act makes self-defense insufficient grounds for a license and imposes rigorous competency checks, background vetting, and periodic renewals on lawful owners. None of that kept AK-47s out of criminal hands.
A parallel crisis is unfolding: police confirmed a tenth woman's body was found Saturday near Johannesburg, part of a string of killings near the city's airport that has raised serial-killer fears. CBS News reported that most victims were women in their 20s and 30s, several found naked or partially clothed near main roads. Two women have been arrested in connection with one of the killings, but police said they could not rule out links among the others.
The outlets covering these stories share one omission: not one mentions that South Africa's gun control regime disarmed exactly the wrong people. The Guardian called the shootings "shocking even to a country used to some of the highest violent crime rates in the world." CBS highlighted "high rates of violent crime and violence against women." WTOP and the Post stuck to the body counts. What none will say is that the laws designed to prevent this ensured the victims could only run or hide.
The gun laws didn't keep AK-47s away from eight gunmen in Wedela. They didn't protect 17 people in a tavern, 10 people eating grilled meat, or 11 people at a house party. The laws disarmed the victims. The killers never obeyed them.
That's the fact the establishment press won't touch.
