Cele praises police for work against crooks

Police Commissioner General Bheki Cele says the drop in crime was thanks to hard police work and "not the work of the Holy Ghost coming down into the hearts of criminals".

He was speaking at the announcement of crime statistics by Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa in Pretoria.

The statistics showed:

• Murder, believed internationally to be the best indicator of crime levels, fell 5.3% from 16834 in 2009/2010 to 15940 this year.
• A 10% decrease in house robberies, from 18786 cases last year to 16889 cases this year. This crime saw a sharp increase over the past three years and was at 9351 cases in 2003/2004.
• Business robberies, which focused on smaller businesses, spaza shops and supermarkets, rose 0.9% to 14667. This crime has grown. There were 4387 reported cases five years ago.
• Car hijackings have finally shown a downward trend, dropping below 11000 cases for the first time in five years to 10627 reported cases.
• Contact crimes, which involve some form of violence and include sexual offences, attempted murder, assault and robbery generally decreased by 6.9%. This included a decrease in cases of robbery with aggravating circumstances of 10.8% from 113755 cases to 101463.
• Cash-in-transit heists decreased to 291 cases from a 2006/07 high of 467. Police believe an increase of 61.5% in ATM blasts, to 399, show robbers are now turning to ATM bombings.

Mthethwa said the "war on crime must continue; a war by the way, that has been declared by heartless criminals on law-abiding citizens".

But experts and opposition parties have cautioned that we should not crack open the champagne just yet.

DA leader Helen Zille said the decrease in crime rates was "fantastic", but said one incidence of crime was one too many. She said she would analyse the statistics carefully.

"It would be very sad if crime stats were coming down because we are not policing as effectively as we have to and people are not reporting the crimes any more."

Gareth Newham, head of the Crime and Justice Programme at the Institute for Security Studies, said he was not so concerned about what the statistics showed, but rather about the fact that they are not released more often.

"These crime statistics are now six months out of date while the whole country is patting itself on the back," he said.