By: Natasha Archary

The South African Police Service (SAPS) have made 100 000 arrests with Operation Shanela, since May 2023.
National Police Commisioner, General Fannie Masemola said the high-density operation, “Operation Shanela”, is making strides and progress in the fight against crime.
To date, 109 540 arrests have been made, with more than 9 500 suspects being arrested in the past week alone.
Masemola said the success of the operation rests on a multi-disciplinary and integrated approach in fighting crime, working together with various government departments and law enforcement agencies, such as local, metro and traffic police officials.
“We are registering commendable progress in the fight against crime, the number of those arrested during this period gives us hope that this is a step in the right direction.
Working closely with all stakeholders in the fight against crime including our communities, we can achieve more successes.
We will continue with heightened visibility operations so as to continue to rid our communities off all forms of criminality.”
General Fannie Masemola on Operation Shanela’s successes over the past few months
Thousands of unlicensed firearms and counterfeit goods were recovered, and a number of suspects were arrested in connection with murder, rape and other serious crimes.
Operation Shanela includes high police visibility with regular roadblocks, tracing of wanted suspects, searches at premises, cordon and searches at problematic hostels, unlicensed liquor premises, compliance inspections at licensed liquor outlets, second hand goods dealers, scrapyards, informal businesses such as spaza shops to ensure labour law compliance, and compliance visits at mines and farming areas.
From 08 May to date, 1 550 illegal and unlicensed firearms were recovered.
The breakdown of recoveries is as follows to date:
- 744 vehicles that were either stolen or hijacked were recovered
- 129 499kg of copper cables recovered
- 374 138 counterfeit items were recovered
- 13 603 wanted suspects were arrested for murder, rape and other crimes
- 10 645 illegal immigrants were arrested for being in the country illegally
- 1 512 suspects were arrested for murder
- 1 090 for attempted murder
- 1 694 arrested for rape
- 4 129 suspect were found in possession of drugs
- 433 hijackers were arrested
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