Bheki Cele Shatters Stereotypes: Nigerians, Zimbabweans, and Other Foreigners Not Responsible for Crime in South Africa

Bheki Cele Proves Nigerians, Zimbabweans, and Other Foreigners Not Responsible for Crime in South Africa

South Africa’s Police Minister Bheki Cele has debunked the long-standing stereotype that foreigners including Nigerians and Zimbabweans are responsible for crime in the country.

Also read: Seychelles Bans Nigerian Tourists: Echoes South Africa’s Accusations and Stereotypes

Prison Stats Prove Foreigners Are Not Responsible for Crime In South Africa

In a media briefing on Sunday, Cele shared that out of the almost 158,000 individuals incarcerated in South Africa’s prisons, approximately 14,000 are foreigners, while the vast majority, around 144,000, are South Africans. These figures challenge the narrative that foreign nationals are mainly responsible for crime in South Africa.

Cele’s remarks came as part of an update on the achievements of the police service in addressing serious and violent crimes, as well as improvements in crime intelligence.

“South Africa’s prisons have almost 14,000 foreigners [and about] 144,000 South Africans. So it could not be true that it’s only foreigners who are causing crime,” Cele said.

Highlighting the outcomes of crime intelligence-led operations, Cele revealed that more than 3,700 suspects have been arrested for serious offences such as murder, extortion, and kidnapping over the past 11 months.

Also read: ‘We Are Not All Criminals’ : Nigeria’s President Tinubu Pushes Back Against Stereotyping of Nigerians As Cybercriminals

Mzansi Offers Reactions and Counterarguments

After the statistics were made public, South Africans took to X (formerly Twitter) and weighed in. While some argued that the prison statistics might not accurately reflect the actual crime situation, others suggested that the low number of foreigners in prisons could indicate the challenges law enforcement faces in tracking down illegal immigrants involved in criminal activities. Additionally, others suggested that some foreign nationals might return to their home countries to evade arrest after committing crimes in South Africa.

Here are some of the comments:

@SaazNx:

Surely this assessment is skewed, you can’t use prison numbers as the only metric to determine the primary source of crime. There are other variables that come into play.

@DagamaMoremi:

Simply because majority of them goes back to their home countries after committing crime….Dom kop.

@Bops_Peedee:

Most are getting away with crime because Police cant detect them, since they are illegal foreigners and home affairs don’t have their fingerprints…easier to arrest South Africans since is easy to detect their fingerprints unlike border jumpers who are committing crimes in RSA

@uncertza:

This actually proves that foreigners disproportionately do more crime than South Africans. For foreigners to be 10% of prison population when they are estimated 3 million in SA, this proves that foreigners are twice as likely to do crime in SA than South Africans.

@BEEtycoon:

Last year he said there were 500 000 South Africans in prison, while Lamola told parliament in 2021 there 28 000 foreigner convicted between Sept 2019 and 2021. We don’t believe their thumb sucked numbers. DCS doesn’t disaggregate its numbers so they can lie like this

The post Bheki Cele Shatters Stereotypes: Nigerians, Zimbabweans, and Other Foreigners Not Responsible for Crime in South Africa appeared first on iHarare News.