"Alarmed father accidentally stabs son to death"; "Gangster with bow and arrow kills pupil in schoolyard from the street"; "12 mourners beaten to death in minibus taxi on main road". All highly improbable incidents anywhere in civilised society, but change the weapons deployed to firearms and we have three of the shocking headlines that have beset our gun-toting country in the past month.
After the slaughter on the R74 last weekend, our police minister mentioned, in the small print, a tightening up on control of gun licences, together with an amnesty period. Don’t waste your time, Mr Cele. Get real, get a grip and ban all private ownership of handguns and automatic weapons, and severely restrict licensing of hunting rifles.
Then, after a brief amnesty period, equip police vehicles (and police stations) with crushers for police officers to instantly and permanently decommission illegal weapons discovered through "stop and search" procedures, then arrest the possessor. As the US regularly demonstrates to the world, the absence of effective gun control facilitates senseless killings.
In the UK, homicides involving firearms have reduced by almost two-thirds since handguns were outlawed 20 years ago.
In this country we need to urgently address the astronomical murder rate and a certain starting point is to drastically reduce the availability of lethal weapons.
In the UK, it was the slaughter of 16 schoolchildren by one crazed gunman in 1996 that moved the nation and generated the political will to act. What more motivation do we need beyond the headlines mentioned above?
James Olive
Via e-mail
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.