Western Cape gangs growing more complex & difficult to police

Gangs in the Western Cape are becoming more complex, fragmented and increasingly difficult to police, with internal gang splits fuelling ongoing violence.

That is the view in the latest Western Cape Gang Monitor report by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime.

The report said gang members are defecting to rival groups, with leadership battles and the formation of splinter groups.

Researchers describe fragmentation as “a structural process that is reshaping the way gangs in the Western Cape organise and compete”.

This trend is believed to be contributing to the (often deadly) violence in several hotspot areas.

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Internal battles within groups, like the Junky Funky Kids (JFK), have been especially severe, with the report noting that around 70 killings in recent months were linked to JFK infighting.

“Internal instability within Western Cape gangs, and the associated risk of fragmentation, undermines leadership structures, fuels violence and erodes community safety. When combined with long-standing inter-gang rivalries, these tensions generate highly unpredictable and often deadly conflict dynamics.”

The study also highlights how children are being drawn into gang culture through stone-throwing clashes in Cape Flats communities. It warns that these incidents “should not automatically be dismissed as inconsequential altercations between children. In certain contexts, the activity operates as an early sign of conflict within broader gang dynamics”.

Researchers further noted that while military deployments can temporarily stabilise violent areas, they may have very little impact, noting that previous deployments “failed to provide meaningful or lasting reductions in violence”.

“While a visible military presence may temporarily suppress gang violence, it does not typically disrupt the underlying criminal economy.”

Further to this, the report mentioned that one gang source told researchers that “the army can’t really stop the business”.

Expansion

The report also spoke to the expansion of Cape Town-based gang territories to the West Coast. With the “growing global cocaine industry”, the report suggests that South Africa is becoming a bigger player in the logistics thereof.

Areas like Vredenburg and Saldanha Bay have, as such, proven to be good targets for gangs, due to their “geography, infrastructure and comparatively low security profile”, the report read.

“As well as major ports such as Cape Town and Durban, traffickers are increasingly exploiting South Africa’s secondary ports, including Saldanha Bay. These less busy locations offer a combination of weaker surveillance, limited policing capacity and easy access to inland distribution routes.”

What to do

In response to the growing violence, the report argues that lasting progress will depend on intelligence-led policing, stronger investigations and prosecutions, better community protection and long-term social interventions.