Researcher and political analyst Thembisa Fakude says stolen firearms are exacerbating the high level of gun violence in South Africa.

He was reacting to the deaths of rapper, Kiernan Forbes, known as AKA, and long-time friend Tebello ‘Tibz’ Motsoane, who were shot on Friday night outside a restaurant in Durban.

Also in KwaZulu-Natal, Inkosi Zwelakhe Ndaba of the Emhlungwini Traditional Council at Ntabamhlophe near Estcourt in the midlands was shot and killed at the weekend.

Fakude says thousands of guns are reported stolen every year.

He says, “You have about 9000 guns that are annually reported to either have been stolen or missing, so we don’t know where those guns are. The other factor which is important, you have a lot of unregistered illegal persons in South Africa, who we have no track of who they are, where they come from, what are they here to do, so that also adds to the complications that we find ourselves in.”

“But also South Africa is increasingly becoming a place for organised crime and this comes with the relative economic success and potential that South Africa has, and as a result is attracting these international syndicates in this country,” Fakude adds.

VIDEO: Full interview with Senior Research Fellow at the Africa-Asia Dialogues, Thembisa Fakude on report that shows gun violence is the leading cause of murder: