The Citizen reports that the question of whether off-duty police officers should be allowed to take weapons home has been raised following concerns raised by the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid).  

The unit recently expressed its concern after a murder case was opened against a police officer in KwaZulu-Natal.  This prompted a gun control advocacy group to suggest the police had not conducted enough research into the circumstances surrounding the increasing incidences of death and gun violence involving off-duty police officers.  Gun Free SA spokesperson Adele Kirsten said more data was needed to investigate the correlation between the possession of guns by off-duty officers and murders either committed by officers, or their deaths.  Kirsten indicated that they had engaged with trade unions on the issue reported further that:  “The unions will tell you that police officers are at higher risk of being targeted [by criminals] because they were known to be carrying weapons, but we do not have evidence of this.”  According to the last official statistics – from 2014 to 2015 – a third of all officers killed that year were off duty.  But, only by finding out what were the biggest causes behind deaths involving off-duty officers could it be decided whether off-duty officers should carry guns and why.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Simnikiwe Hlatshaneni on page 4 of The Citizen of 29 October 2019

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