Tafelsig, Mitchells Plain — Two letters, HL, mark the concrete at the entrance to Tafelsig: the signature of the Hard Livings gang that has terrorised Cape Town’s outskirts for decades. The graffiti is a stark reminder of why President Cyril Ramaphosa announced a plan to deploy the military to communities across South Africa to help fight gangs, drugs and illegal mining.
The announcement followed the state of the nation address in February. Many residents in areas likely to be targeted — including Mitchells Plain on the Cape Flats, a cluster of densely populated, under-resourced townships southeast of the city — greeted the prospect with fatigue rather than hope. In neighbourhoods of modest houses, shacks and spazas, locals say the violence is part of daily life: shootings that once felt near-daily, killings in drug dens, and high-profile murders that shook entire communities.
Michael Jacobs, who chairs a local community policing forum, drives through streets where children play among corrugated-roofed homes and people sit outside small shops. He and others track incidents on WhatsApp groups and shared videos of attacks on civilians; recent cases include schoolchildren and a taxi driver shot outside a school, one of the pupils later dying. A four-person killing in an Athlone drug den that included an infant, and the fatal shooting of a well-known cleric during Ramadan, are among incidents that underscore local fear.
Ramaphosa said troops would be sent to the Western Cape and Gauteng to assist policing efforts against gangs and illegal miners; Acting Police Minister Firoz Cachalia later added the Eastern Cape, announcing a deployment window of about 10 days. The move follows pressure from civil-society groups and opposition parties — the DA, which runs the Western Cape, staged protests with residents in cities such as Gqeberha demanding urgent action.
Statistics cited by police over a recent period recorded 15,846 arrests nationwide and the seizure of 173 firearms and 2,628 rounds of ammunition between Feb. 16 and the following Sunday. Gauteng reported major arrests and the confiscation of counterfeit goods valued at about 98 million rand. Official figures point to an average of roughly 64 homicides per day across the country.
But many residents and analysts question whether a military presence will address the root causes of gang recruitment and drug trafficking: entrenched poverty, unemployment and the collapse of local commerce. Once-busy shopping centres have become ghosted by decline and illicit trade; children can be recruited into gang life as young as eight, community leaders say, and many adults eke out livelihoods by collecting recyclables.
There are legal and historical constraints on using the armed forces in civilian settings. Irvin Kinnes, an associate professor at the University of Cape Town’s Centre for Criminology, notes that soldiers are meant to support the police, who remain in command. He warns that previous domestic deployments — to the Western Cape in 2019 during rises in violence and again during COVID-19 enforcement in 2020 — offer cautionary lessons about potential heavy-handedness and civilian harm.
Analysts underscore the need for social interventions alongside any security operations. “You can’t just plug the hole with boots on the ground,” said Ryan Cummings, director of analysis at Signal Risk, arguing that sustained investment in communities is essential to cut off organised crime’s recruitment and supply chains.
Scepticism runs deep because of South Africa’s past. Many township residents still recall apartheid-era military crackdowns; Jacobs himself cited being arrested during a 1987 student protest on the Cape Flats. There is also growing concern about corruption within the police service. A commission probing police misconduct has implicated senior officers and led to high-level suspensions, and some soldiers who have taken part in joint operations say poor cooperation from the police undermines effectiveness.
A soldier who served in previous domestic deployments, speaking under a pseudonym, said joint actions were often stymied by police non-cooperation and alleged collusion with criminal networks. He insisted the military is ready to act but acknowledged constitutional limits and that success hinges on police performance.
The government insists the military’s role will be carefully circumscribed. Ramaphosa has framed the deployment as supportive: time-limited, with rules of engagement intended to protect civilians and to free up police resources so specialised antigang and anti-mining units can operate more effectively. He pointed to past operations where troops provided disaster relief or border support as precedents.
Critics say the move risks being symbolic, timed for political effect ahead of local elections, and unlikely to produce long-term safety unless paired with jobs programmes, youth services, anti-corruption measures and community policing reform. They caution that short-term crackdowns can inflame tensions without removing the economic and social drivers of crime.
On the ground in Mitchells Plain and neighbouring districts, residents wait warily. For many the central question is not whether soldiers can temporarily clear streets, but whether any intervention will interrupt a cycle of deprivation and organised crime — or simply shift patterns of violence while the underlying problems remain.