To keep murders on a downward trajectory, South Africa must prioritise and fund interventions that prevent family violence.

The number of murders is plummeting in South Africa. Or is it? And if so, is it because of policing or something else? And what about violence in homes, where most of the country’s serious assaults occur?

Recently released South African Police Service (SAPS) crime statistics show a 20% drop in murder in the first quarter of 2026 compared to the same period in 2024. The decrease immediately generated debate, with almost as many competing explanations as there were commentators.

Between 1 January and 31 March 2026, 5 181 murders were recorded by police. During the first three months of 2024, the number was 6 536 (see graph). The decline is not restricted to the January-March period. Data from police quarterly reports indicates that 16% fewer murders were recorded in the 2025/26 financial year than in 2023/24.

This is a meaningful reduction, though murder levels remain extremely high by international standards, and far too many lives are lost through murder in South Africa each year.

Explaining the drop in murder levels since 2024 is a challenge. Jonny Steinberg, writer and academic at Yale University’s Council on African Studies, argues that because nothing significant has changed in South Africa over the past two years, a decline of this scale strains credibility and may point to a problem with the data.

Gareth Newham, Special Adviser to Acting Police Minister Firoz Cachalia, countered that the decline reflects real improvements in policing – particularly the targeting of murder hotspots. He argues that it may also reflect early returns from evidence-based violence prevention programmes, including the expansion of parenting support interventions.

Jean Redpath, Senior Researcher at the Dullah Omar Institute at the University of the Western Cape, is sceptical of the policing explanation. Her analysis suggests the drop correlates more closely with the end of load-shedding (electricity cuts). Simply put, when the lights are on, the opportunity for crime reduces.

Political analyst and commentator James Myburgh offers a different reading. He says murder levels are simply returning to what they were before the post-Covid-19 surge and the July 2021 uprising.

During 2020/21, at the height of the pandemic, the murder rate dropped to 33.5 per 100 000. The following year, it jumped back up to 41.8, and in 2022/3 rose again to 45.2. The 2021 uprising contributed 350 murders to the total number of 25 181 murders that year.

Myburgh links the current decline to falling aggravated robbery rates. He argues that the shift towards a cashless economy has reduced the cash yield from business and home robberies, changing the calculus for organised criminal networks.

He says the country may be seeing an increase in kidnappings because these are now more lucrative or certain to deliver results for robbers. The SAPS stats do indeed show a rise in kidnappings from 4 478 in the first quarter of 2025 to 4 571 in the same period this year, making this argument plausible.

The data on aggravated robberies that the SAPS calls ‘trio crimes’ lends weight to Myburgh’s argument: house robberies fell 18.3%, business robberies 22%, and vehicle hijackings 20.4% compared to the same quarter last year.

These declines almost certainly helped push the murder rate down. But Redpath’s load-shedding correlation and Newham’s policing improvements are not mutually exclusive arguments, and crime rarely has a single cause. The likely answer is that several factors are simultaneously at work.

The debate around what is driving this trend is healthy and necessary. But it risks obscuring that the most significant driver of violent crime, including murder, in South Africa is not organised robbery networks, load shedding or policing gaps.

Rather, it is arguments between people who know each other – whether sparked by the urge for revenge, punishment or retaliation. This is valuable information because police action can do little to reduce these types of murders.

Consider that 73% of the 19 427 serious assaults reported to police in the first quarter of 2026 took place in people’s homes. This figure is an underestimate, since assaults in the home are chronically underreported and frequently go unrecorded even when police are notified. None of the commentators’ reasons for the recent decline in murders accounts for the violence that happens in our homes.

When at least 14 270 people are victims of home-based assault in a single quarter – much of which is almost certainly witnessed by children – it is not surprising that cycles of violence prove so difficult to break. Add to this the 93 reported rapes in educational facilities, including creches, and it is clear that South Africa faces not only a policing problem, but also a deep social problem.

Better policing, reliable electricity supply, and tackling organised crime all matter. But none of them will deliver sustained reductions in murder unless family violence prevention becomes a national priority.

The evidence base for what works already exists in South Africa. Workplace programmes like Free to Grow, parenting programmes delivered through the South African Parenting Programme Implementers Network, and survivor support services run by non-governmental organisations across the country contribute to addressing interpersonal violence.

The problem is that they depend almost entirely on shrinking donor pools and Department of Social Development grants – an unstable foundation for a sustained national effort.

If South Africa is serious about keeping the murder rate on a downward trajectory, it needs to prioritise and fund interventions that build safe households, not treat them as a discretionary add-on.

Written by Chandré Gould, Senior Research Fellow, Justice and Violence Prevention, ISS