Illegal taverns to top agenda at upcoming safety summit

Gauteng police say the growing number of liquor outlets breaking the law will be among the top issues discussed during an upcoming tavern safety summit.

The National Liquor Traders in South Africa convened the summit on Wednesday following the Bekkersdal mass shooting in the west of Johannesburg, which claimed the lives of ten people.

Gunmen stormed the Kwanoxolo tavern in the early hours of Sunday morning, shooting at random.

According to police, the gunmen also shot at people on the streets as they fled the scene.

Sunday's shooting was the second attack this month after 12 people were killed at a tavern in Tshwane.

Acting Gauteng Police Commissioner Fred Kekana says authorities have met to also discuss enforcing regulations and reducing violence during the festive season.

“We were sharing those issues together and sensitising each other that they are committing crime and they must die. And also liquor that is not genuine, fake liquor, liquor that is manufactured behind a shack somewhere else and is distributed and sold with the level of a good company or a good type of liquor distributor, which later on becomes a problem when it comes to health,” Kekana said.

Kekana has also assured the Bekkersdal community that police will stop at nothing to find all those responsible for the recent attack.

Eleven people were arrested on Wednesday for being in possession of unlicensed firearms.

Those arrested include 9 Basotho nationals, 1 Mozambican and 1 South African arrested for harbouring undocumented foreign nationals.

While the group has not been positively connected to the crime, one of the men has been named as a person of interest for the shooting.

Kekana says forensic teams are processing evidence that could link the guns found with the 11 suspects to cartridges found at the scene of the mass shooting.

“Yeah, no, they will be taken for ballistics, and the ballistics will not only link them with one specific incident, but also every incident where these firearms were used; they will be linked. It cannot necessarily be Bekkersdal alone, but any other incidents where the firearms were used. And that will resolve the whole issue of linkages and which cases,” he added.