4 dead, 4 injured after gunman opens fire at South African taxi stand

Gunmen who opened fire at a taxi stand in a small coastal South African town killed four people who were sitting in a minibus and wounded another four Tuesday, police said.

The motive for the attack was unknown, police said, but the killings mean 36 people have died in five separate mass shootings in South Africa since the start of the year.

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The country of 60 million has one of the highest homicide rates in the world. An average of 30 people were killed with a firearm each day in the first three months of 2023, according to police statistics.

Tuesday’s mass shooting followed the same trend as many of the others, with multiple gunmen firing at people.

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Brig. Jay Naicker, a police spokesperson, said in a statement that the gunmen opened fire on the taxi minibus in the east coast town of Port Shepstone, killing four of the occupants. Four other people were taken to the hospital with gunshot wounds, Naicker said.

In April, 10 members of the same family died in the year’s worst mass shooting when gunmen entered their home in what police described as a predawn ambush. Seven of the victims were female and one was a 13-year-old boy, police said.

Although shootings often involve illegal firearms, South Africa struggles with a high crime rate across the board, not only gun crime.