Old Boks Call for Silence for Farm Murder AND Violent Crime Victims at Currie Cup Final

The 1995 World Cup Springbok rugby team has appealed to the South African Rugby Union (SARU) for a moment of silence for all victims of farm murders and violent crimes in South Africa, to be held before Saturday’s Currie Cup final between the Sharks and the Western Province at Kings Park stadium in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal.

This appeal follows the heartfelt request by a Franschhoek farm manager and friend of Joubert Conradie who was murdered on his farm in the Western Cape on Tuesday morning. Chris Loubser asked that South Africans wear black on Monday, and that a minute’s silence be held before the Currie Cup Final.

AfriForum announced on Thursday that it has created a platform where members of the public can add their support to the 1995 World Cup Springbok rugby team’s appeal to SARU.

In their appeal to SARU the former Boks stated that “violent crimes destroy communities throughout the country” and also emphasised the growing number of farm attacks and murders, as well as the 2016/2017 crime statistics in South Africa that were recently announced.

More than 90 people have been killed in and around the Glebelands Hostel in KZN since 2014, and yet no arrests have been made in connection with the deaths.

The world average murder rate is 6,2 per 100 000 people per year. The South African murder ratio is 34,1 per 100 000 per year.

And “since 1 January 2017 at least 341 farm attacks have already been carried out, in which 70 people were killed. This means that thus far in 2017, more murders have been committed during farm attacks than in the total number of farm murders during 2016,” says Ernst Roets, AfriForum’s deputy CEO.

The world average murder rate is 6,2 per 100 000 people per year. The South African murder ratio is 34,1 per 100 000 per year. The ratio at which commercial farmers in South Africa are being killed has been calculated at an extreme 156 per 100 000 per year.

South Africa’s latest crime stats include:

• a total of 19 016 murders took place in the last financial year
• there were 49 660 sexual offences, 18 205 cases of attempted murder and 170 616 cases of assault with the intent to inflict grievous bodily harm in the same year (and this is only those which were reported).

To add your name to the appeal to SARU, click here.