Four South African cities among the Top 50 most violent globally

• Gqeberha has ranked 9th in the world’s top 50 most violent cities report by the Mexican Council for Public Security and Criminal Justice
• The other three South African cities on the 2023/24 report were Durban, Cape Town and Johannesburg
• The annual report predominantly features cities from South America, the USA, Jamacia and Haiti

Zingisa Chirwa is an experienced Briefly News journalist based in Johannesburg, South Africa, who has covered current affairs on the radio for over 15 years.

Gqeberha was ranked 9th among the top 50 of the world’s most violent cities, surpassing Cape Town, Durban, and Johannesburg. Images: Stock Images Source: Getty Images

Gqeberha has ranked 9th in the world’s top 50 most violent cities.

Four SA cities make the Top 50

The Eastern Cape city was the highest-ranking South African city on the 2023/24 report by the Mexican Council for Public Security and Criminal Justice.

Durban, Cape Town and Johannesburg placed 16th, 17th and 34th on the list, respectively

According to BusinessTech, the annual list looked at the number of murders per 100,000 people, and only considered cities with populations over 300,000, with available murder stats.

Over the past decade, the Top 50 list has been dominated by South American countries, with the rest being a combination of nations in the Americas, including Haiti, Jamaica, and the USA. South Africa was the only non-Americas country featured in the ranking at all.

The study further revealed that only five cities recorded over 2,000 murders – and three were from SA. These included Johannesburg at 3,084, Cape Town at 3,072, and Durban at 2,653.

Eastern Cape police probe freak drowning

Briefly News reported that the SAPS was investigating the drowning of a 32-year-old woman at the Gqeberha harbour in the Eastern Cape.

Witnesses working at the harbour’s car terminal told the police that they saw the woman’s bakkie accelerate before landing into the ocean.

The woman was unable to get out of the sinking car and subsequently died.