Some people read my blog simply to be entertained. This post probably isn’t for you. However, I’ve had a lot of soon-to-be expats contact me, and one of the top things they want to know about is safety and crime in South Africa. If you’re wondering if you’ll still be alive a few months after moving to South Africa, this post is for YOU.
When you ask people their initial thoughts about South Africa, they’ll probably mention apartheid, crime, and wildlife, or at least a couple of those things. I’m not going to touch the apartheid thing with a ten-foot pole; let’s just say the aftereffects are still palpable, especially when you move away from the major city centres. I may one day be brave enough to try to tackle such an incredibly contentious and sensitive issue on this blog, but today isn’t that day. As far as wildlife goes, I’ve already posted about it here and here. And I’m not gonna lie- I’ll probably do it again.
Crime- well, that’s a whole other story. I’m going to start with a disclaimer- if you’re reading this, you are PROBABLY an expat or soon-to-be expat. Or a tourist. Your experience will be like mine in that it’s much different from the day-to-day reality of many South Africans. I’m entirely cognizant of the fact I live in a bit of a bubble, but that’s my only reference point right now, and I’m betting it will be similar to your experience.
Heads up- these aren’t the only places in which people get hijacked
When I first told people I was moving from Canada to South Africa, I was mostly met with blank stares followed by, “You’re moving your family THERE? Don’t you love them?” To be quite honest, I WAS a bit nervous. We’ve all heard the stories. But I also saw an opportunity, and rewards are generally commensurate with the risks you take to achieve them.
I’m 9 months in now, and while I’m certainly still new, I do feel I’ve learned how to navigate this country pretty decently. And I’m still alive, so that fact alone should say something.
If you’re an expat and you’re moving to South Africa, here are a few of your realities:
- You’ll probably be in either a secure estate or at least a very secure house. While crime can happen ANYWHERE, this greatly reduces your risk.
- You probably won’t need to visit too many places with very high crime rates. You might pass through once in a while, but your place of work generally won’t be smack in the middle of crime central.
- You’re going to get an orientation. By that, I mean your company will very likely hire a company to take you around the first few days and educate you on the “do’s” and “don’ts” of living here. If your company hasn’t included this, negotiate it into your contract. It’s worth it.
OK, so all those things are great, and I’m sure you can see how they’ll help, but surely with the murder rate so high, you’ll be dead within a month, right?
Not so fast. While I’m not going to deny the murder rate here is very high compared to what you’re probably used to back home (as of 2014, it had the 9th highest murder rate in the world), the chances that YOU will be murdered are lower than you’d think.
First, let’s get some stuff out of the way. You’ll hear and read a lot about how violent crime has risen exponentially since the end of apartheid in 1994. What’s actually happened is the number of RECORDED violent crime has gone up. The record keeping prior to ’94 was heavily white weighted. Obviously, numerous crimes of all colours were recorded. But the fact is that many crimes in the townships weren’t reported at all. You can see why the figures may have seemed to jump in the years after apartheid. Experts estimate that violent crime has risen only about 1% since 1994; the only difference is it’s much more visible now.
And the people who are most vulnerable to crime today, as they have always been, are low-income black South Africans. While there is frequent paranoia here (I’m not making this up- I hear of the “White Genocide” almost daily), here’s a stat bomb for you: while 8.8% of South Africa’s population is white, whites make up only 1.8% of murder victims. This even takes into account farm attacks, which are horrific and heavily reported. Being a farmer in South Africa is statistically more dangerous than being a cop. But that means if you take out the farm attacks, whites are even SAFER than most assume. But whatever colour you are, if you’re not in the bottom of the income bracket here, your chances of being a victim of violent crime are greatly reduced. My heart does go out to those who live in high-risk situations; income disparity here is a real issue. But that’s a whole other story. The marginalized in any society are always the ones who bear the brunt of violence.
What I’m saying here is you’re likely not going to run into issues, ESPECIALLY if you’re vigilant. You don’t need to be paranoid, but definitely be cautious and aware of your surroundings at all times. By watching my mirrors, I did notice someone holding an empty glass bottle by the neck when I was at a drive through a few months ago. He was hiding behind a wall and kept peeking out- obviously waiting for the worker to pass my food out the window. I suspect he was going to hit my hand and take the food, and that would have been the best case scenario. When the worker opened the window, the guy moved out and up alongside my car. I rolled my window down just a crack and told the worker to keep her window closed because there was a guy coming who was up to no good (he was out of her line of sight). The would-be thief immediately moved away, put his hands up, and claimed he wasn’t going to do anything. We waited for him to walk away before taking our food. I know this could have been much worse, but if I saw him with another weapon, I wouldn’t have waited at all. I would have just gotten out of there, even if it meant hopping the curb and potentially damaging my car. My point is, ALWAYS be aware.
Here are some more tips to help you out:
- When possible, slow down well before a red light so you don’t have to stop at an intersection. In traffic, this is impossible but pretty easy to do at night.
- Never box yourself in. Leave some room between you and the car in front of you in case you need to break away suddenly.
- Many hijackings occur at intersections, so be very aware when you do have to stop. Don’t be distracted by your phone or anything else. I haven’t had problems with street vendors (I’ve even bought stuff from them sometimes), but a common tactic is for a vendor to approach your window, and while you’re distracted, someone will smash the opposite window. Never focus only on the obvious.
- The other place a lot of hijackings occur is right outside your gate to your home. Again, remove all distractions as you approach your gate. If another car approaches, abort and drive away quickly.
- Hide your phone, laptop bag, purse, etc as you drive. Many crimes happen simply because an opportunity exists. Remove the opportunity.
- If you DO get hijacked, never look at the criminals in the eyes- keep your head down and do as you’re told. The ONLY time you should speak is if you have young kids you need to remove from a car seat- calmly tell your attacker everything you have is theirs and that you are just going to get your kids so there are no complications. And do it from INSIDE the car. Once you exit your door, the car is gone.
- Practice with your family, especially if you have young kids. My 7 year old knows how to undo his younger sister’s car seat harness, and they both know my code word for “This is real- shut up, unbuckle, and climb up to me and out my door as quickly and quietly as possible.”
- Don’t wear expensive watches and jewellery.
- Try to avoid driving at night, especially in unfamiliar areas.
- Don’t explore too much until you’ve been here for a couple of months and have gotten to know which areas you should avoid.
- Be super vigilant at ATMs. Never accept help with a “broken” ATM (that’s usually a ruse to rob you), and only use ATMs in brightly lit areas where there are a lot of people around. Trust your gut- if you feel at all uncomfortable, just go to one somewhere else.
All of the above won’t guarantee your safety, but if you’re careful, you’ll probably be just fine. If any of you have any more tips, please leave them in the comments. And welcome to South Africa! You’re going to love it here.
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What frustrates me in this article is you’re saying it’s okay to climatize yourself to be surrounded in such situations where there is a high probability of crime affecting your life. All you need to do is “1,2,3,4-100” then you may be okay. Furthermore boasting that you’re still alive after 9 months further outlines my point. Why would you want to live in a place where this point is even needed as a reference?
Take it from an expat who by 27 has his family was tied up in their house at gunpoint only to be told they were “lucky” nothing more happened. As the bowling frog anitodte ever goes on. Along with that my car was stolen, our Steers robbed in excess of 5 times and never mind my cellphones , laptops and other it’s stolen over the years. This while all living in the predominately affluent area of Hyde Park. Hence why I now safely reside in Canada knowing I don’t need my family to do a list of daily routines to may be safe for the next 9 months!!!
I appreciate the comment, Scott. As I mention very early in the post, it wasn’t intended for most South Africans. I wrote it for expats who are either new here, or on their way.
I’ll be the first to admit I can never truly know what it’s like to live here as a South African. I KNOW I live in an expat bubble, as will my intended audience for that particular post.
I’m happy that you’re feeling much more safe in Canada, and I wish you nothing but the best there!
I agree with you Scott. I’m completely annoyed at his article. My friend was recently murdered for a small amount of cash. I’ve had it. I can’t handle having to watch my every move, every single second of my day. It’s ridiculous.
I would love to move to Canada. However, I am a very active person – swim and run every day of my life and am so confused as to where in Canada to go that I will still be able to do my activities.
Wish you all the best.
Very sorry to hear about your friend, Nicola.
There are many places in Canada where you can be active year around- it just depends on what you want to do. Vancouver has the mildest climate- you can run year round. The rest of the country has great summers, then you can still run through part of the winter, but you can always ski, snowboard, or snowshoe if you want to keep experiencing the great outdoors. I’m partial the the West Coast, and there are great mountains for hiking with incredible views. And for the most part, the only threats to your physical safety will be bears! (Though property crime is surprisingly high in most of the bigger cities. The bright lining is the criminals are very rarely out to hurt you- they just want drug money).
Best of luck!
Having lived 44 years in this country, I have been “lucky” so far – of the four house breaks we had (two while we were home) we were “lucky” every time and had no contact with the robbers. (we live in a low crime area)
I can handle the the thefts, the corruption, the incompetence, etc, but what I cannot handle anymore is the russian-roulette nature of crime.
A portion of black people hate white people outright. Whether one sees it as justified by the past or not, you as a white person have to face this reality and know that you may come face to face with this. Being a foreigner will not make a difference to how you will be treated.
If you happened to NOT be “lucky” during a robbery, you will get a gang that will add the worst you can imagine to what is “just a house-robbery”. Two old family members on my wife’s side went through this for an hour (they were in their seventies). This incident did not even make the local news. (I will spare the gory details as I’m not sure it’s appropriate for this blog, but take this very, very serious)
So, while you are right that expats will not see the brunt of crime, it can be extremely serious and violent should it happen to you. So rather be too paranoid:
1. Make sure your sleeping part of the house is gated from the rest of the house (with a good safety barrier – aka Trelidoor type security gate).
2. Install beams and/or movement sensors outside the house, so that you know there are intruders BEFORE they get into the house.
3. Make sure to have an alarm that is connected to an armed response company (they are better than the police) with easily accessible panic buttons.
4. Get a dog or two that live in the house.
5. Don’t buy popular hi-jack target cars: Toyotas, Volkswagens, BMWs are extremely popular. Go for things like Renault, Volvo – basically anything with crap resale value.
6. Be very careful during the times when you leave and come back home. Hi-jackings and gunpoint house invasions are popular during these times.
7. Don’t be lax in a gated community – syndicates sometimes rent/buy a house in the community and will operate from there. (these tend to be more “professional” criminals and if you cooperate, you would usually not be harmed)
8. If you can avoid contact with the criminals, you should be ok – do everything in your power to avoid contact.
After being a big bad scaremonger – this country has many beautiful people, of all colours. And it’s very sad that a minority of bad people can add so much violence to a country that is in essence full of good people.
I have personally reached the end of my tether and will spend the second half of my life by swapping the fight against crime with a fight against the weather by moving to Canada.
Be safe and God bless.
These are all good points- it doesn’t do any good to be completely naive to what COULD happen. I agree with your safety recommendations.
Thank you for your well- thought out response, and I wish you best of luck in Canada. I know you’ll love it! If you ever have any questions about the great white North, let me know!
Canadian expat here. In the little 1.5 years that I have been here with my wife, we’ve witnessed two corpses, two street beat-downs (broad daylight, no one bothering to help), one robbery on the road and lots of sketchy minor things. Also a ton of traffic accidents. What is disturbing is that typically, no passerby’s were willing to help. In Canada and where we still have a home, everyone would jump in to help. The sheer amount of crime is psychologically destructive, but the nature of the crimes are far worse. There is clearly an element of resentment and raw hatred. I was forewarned by a friend who is a private investigator and contractor for the RCMP, who travelled to SA to check out the police station in Pretoria (along with other crime scenes including the Pistorius case). He said that browsing through the criminal records in Pretoria was very disturbing, not that crimes do not happen elsewhere, but the intensity, violence, hatred as shown in these records. Much of criminals in SA are sociopaths, who regularly show no resentment at all. Additionally, psychology in SA has remained stuck in the 50-60’s prior to the adoption of many modern mental illnesses such as addiction, because statistically, much of the country’s population would be mentally ill in their current mental states.
Canadian expat here. In the little 1.5 years that I have been here with my wife, we’ve witnessed two corpses, two street beat-downs (broad daylight, no one bothering to help), one robbery on the road and lots of sketchy minor things. Also a ton of traffic accidents. What is disturbing is that typically, no passerby’s were willing to help. In Canada and where we still have a home, everyone would jump in to help. The sheer amount of crime is psychologically destructive, but the nature of the crimes are far worse. There is clearly an element of resentment and raw hatred. I was forewarned by a friend who is a private investigator and contractor for the RCMP, who travelled to SA to check out the police station in Pretoria (along with other crime scenes including the Pistorius case). He said that browsing through the criminal records in Pretoria was very disturbing, not that crimes do not happen elsewhere, but the intensity, violence, hatred as shown in these records. Much of criminals in SA are sociopaths, who regularly show no resentment at all. Additionally, psychology in SA has remained stuck in the 50-60’s prior to the adoption of many modern mental illnesses such as addiction, because statistically, much of the country’s population would be mentally ill in their current mental states.
I thoroughly enjoy your articles, Maple and Marula, thank you. Discussing crime in South Africa will always be a challenge, and I find your perspective as a Canadian very interesting. As a South African, I can relate to my fellow-citizens. I love my country but have decided to move to Canada next year. We have two young children, live in a security complex with all the bells and whistles, but crime has still affected our family. What is not mentioned in this article, is the extremely high sexual crime rates in South Africa. Women and children are especially not safe – from all walks of life and race. My personal experiences with crimes afflicted on myself or close family and friends include murder, rape, robberies, hi-jackings, kidnapping (and rape), fraud. I am a very vigilant person, but even that didn’t protect me from violent crime. We lived in Auckland for two years a few years ago, and I felt safe and free for the first time in my adult life. It was liberating to me. I hope Canada will provide the same sense of freedom. I hope you stay safe in South Africa. God bless!
It’s very true that you can never afford to just relax here. You always have to stay alert, and you never know when crime is gonna hit.
You’re going to LOVE Canada! All the best there!
I’m a South African looking to emigrate with my husband to Canada – the main reason being the high crime rate in South Africa. Everything you’ve written in this post is true… Sorry, South Africa, but you’re a very dangerous country to live in. I’ve read some of your other posts and I was dumbfounded when I read your post about houses in Canada not having burglar bars and high walls. We’ve gotten so used to our prison-houses and to being so vigilant while driving and walking around in a mall that we don’t generally realise that it doesn’t have to be this way. I pray every single time I get into the car to drive to our nearest Woolies to get groceries, and make it safe home every time. But that doesn’t mean it’s okay. I want to be positive, but truth is, after 29 years we’re so fed-up that we’d rather live in a ‘boring’ country with sub-par braais. I really love this country, and I love the people here, and God knows I’ll miss all the good things this country has to offer – the breathtaking sunrises, the adorable elephants and giraffes, the art and culture and our rich languages, to name a few. I’m really enjoying your blog. It’s taught me a lot about the differences in each country. And yes, each one has its own issues, but we can choose which issues we’d rather live with.
It’s sad to see that so many people have hit the point where they feel they need to move to have a better life.
As an outsider, I can’t begin to feel what South Africans feel. I do know that I haven’t met many people who here who haven’t been affected by crime in some way (whether personally or a family member/friend).
It can all be traced back to the crazy inequality here- until that’s sorted out, I fear nothing will change.