South Africa: Violent farm murders- Fetterman speaks out

[philip964]

This was something I was not aware of.

Farm murder is sort of an odd paring, at least here in the United States.

Here the countryside is generally considered safer than in the more urban areas.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Afr ... rm_attacks

There is a lot more information on line. Many of those articles get into the brutality of the murders, some include horrible pictures of the victims who were tortured. The government seems to feel the murder and torture are just a part of the robbery. However the farmers in South Africa feel otherwise. Apparently it has gotten to the point that farming in South Africa is one of the most dangerous jobs you can have in the world.

I thought I would look at how difficult self defense is in South Africa for the law abiding farmer against multiple armed attackers. I found this.

Gun ownership in South Africa.

"Hey everyone, after some questions and prompting on a post of mine on /r/EDC I decided to post this guide on gun law and ownership in South Africa. You might find it interesting since it's pretty uncommon to hear about anything other than American law on here. I won't be going into the situations under which it is legal to use a firearm for self-defence, since that is a lot more complex than in many other countries. This turned a bit into an AMA, so have a look at a lot of the comments too.

First things first, to own a gun in South Africa you must either be a permanent resident or a citizen. You must have no record of violent crime or violation of the Firearms Control Act 60 of 2000 (referred to as the act from now on). If you have committed a violent crime or violated the act, you must wait five years after such charges before you can apply to review your ban on firearm ownership.

The first step to get a firearm in South Africa is apply for firearms competency. You must undergo evaluation at a training provider which has been certified by the South African Police Service which will evaluate your knowledge of the act and usage of firearms. There are separate tests for each category of firearm you wish to own: pistol, shotgun, bolt action rifles, and carbines (any self-loading long arm). The written tests are quite easy, being open book, and the operating tests even easier, requiring 4/5 shots into a relatively large target at very short range with the weapon in question. It's a bit of a joke, but that's what the law requires. Once this is completed you receive a training certificate which you will later provide with your competency application. There is also a competency for black powder weapons (which are much less regulated), however I am not familiar with that process having never gone through it.

You will also have to provide a document from your regular doctor stating that you do not suffer from depression, any other mental illness which causes altered emotional states, or are undergoing any treatment for emotional instability. You must also provide the police with at least two references of close friends or family who will be interviewed (usually via telephone) to judge that you are of sound and reasonable character without a history of violence. This is not strictly compulsory but in my experience has been generally enforced.

Once you have all this you can go down to your local police station where a Designated Firearms Officer (DFO) will take your fingerprints and submit your application for competency. The waiting period for receiving your competency certificate is approximately six weeks as it is performed at the national police headquarters (in the capitol, Pretoria) and includes background checks.

The certificate you receive is valid for life and a copy must be submitted with each firearm application (you can apply for your first firearm license concurrently with your competency application, reducing the waiting time).

At any time during the previous process (or even before) you can already purchase the firearm you wish to own, however the firearm dealership may not release the weapon to you until you present them with a valid firearms license in your name with matching serial number and calibre to the weapon. The dealer will provide you with a form at purchase containing the particulars of the firearm which you must present to your DFO at your local police station. Your current home address and other firearms you own must be detailed on this form, including a motivation for ownership of the firearm being applied for.

The firearm motivation is endless cause of consternation in the local gun community, a lot of people send 40 page motivations which include local crime statistics and the lengths they've gone through to protect themselves. Yet they still get their applications rejected. Mostly this is a failure to properly study the act and to motivate within its requirements. I've never written more than a page and a half as motivation and have never had a license application rejected.

You will once again have to have your fingerprints taken for the application. You can apply under a number of different license categories for your firearm, which I will now describe:

Self Defence (SD) - Valid for five years, limited to one weapon per person, any pistol, revolver, or shotgun which is not self-loading, licensing a weapon outside these limitations requires extra motivation and limits the license validity to two years
Occasional Sport Shooter (OSS) - Valid for ten years, limited to four per person (three if you poses a self defence license), any pistol, revolver, bolt action rifle, or shotgun which is not self-loading
Dedicated Sport Shooter (DSS) - Valid for ten years, unlimited number of weapons of any type, excluding fully automatic weapons, you must compete in a minimum number of accredited shooting association matches each year to maintain this license
Occasional Hunter (OH) - Identical to OSS
Professional Hunter (PH) - Valid for ten years, any number of long arms (legality of hunting using self-loading weapons differs from province to province), you must be a member of an accredited hunting association and fulfil the requirements of that association for each year to maintain this license
Collector - Valid for ten years, any weapons including small artillery pieces and fully automatic weapons may owned under this license, however you must be part of an accredited collectors association and any weapon you wish to license must be motivated along the "theme" of your collection

When your license expires you must repeat the entire application process, including motivation of ownership (another bone of contention amongst local firearm owners).

Additionally you must provide proof that you have a safe for the firearm in question and that it is securely installed in your home, for first time applicants this usually involves a police inspection of the safe in your home.

The usual wait from application submission to license receipt is approximately two months (though during periods of backlogs and strike action it can extend to 12+ months). Your application goes from your local DFO to the provincial headquarters, and then to the capitol headquarters where it is reviewed. If your application is successful, your license card is printed at your provincial headquarters and delivered to your DFO where you can pick it up.

There is no penalty to having your license application denied, usually a reason will be provided and you can apply again immediately, however the entire waiting process starts again. You can appeal a rejected license, but the average wait for an appeal is far longer than simply applying again.

Once you have your weapon and license you can do pretty much whatever you want within legal bounds, you aren't limited by what is written on the license. You can carry your DSS race gun all day and use it for self defence. You can take great-great-grandpa's Boer War Mauser 1898 under PH and use it in IDPA three gun. There are no limitations on barrel lengths, silencers, magazine size, or accessories of any kind, however you may not remove any identifying marks (serial numbers and such) or change the calibre of the weapon (that would require relicensing).

If you want to carry the law requires that it is carried securely (i.e. in a holster) and that it is concealed. It's concealed carry or leave it at home. Open carry is a punishable offence and most local firearm owners believe if it were allowed it would make you a target for criminals. This practically limits carry to pistols, though you can still use any licensed weapon for self defence if you have it at hand. You do not need to apply specifically to carry, the right is granted automatically on receipt of your license (with the limitations I just mentioned).

As for ammunition you can only buy ammunition which is safe to fire in your weapon (basically limited to the calibre it is licensed under, except for rimfire ammunition and revolvers), unless you have DSS or PH you are limited to only 200 rounds of any single calibre in your possession at a time. Reloading supplies are limited to 2400 primers, 2.4kg of powder, and 200 empty brass outside of DSS or PH.

Lastly, you must notify the firearms registry of a change in your home address within 30 days of moving.

I think that covers just about everything, I'll post any corrections in the comments and mention them at the top of this post."

[Abraham]

On a side note, a few years back my wife and I went to visit a doctor friend and his family who'd moved to New Zealand.

One night, we went to a party where almost all were MD's. About ten of them were from South Africa.

They'd all moved to N.Z. because they to a person stated, it'd become to darn dangerous to live in South Africa.

[bblhd672]

On a side note, a few years back my wife and I went to visit a doctor friend and his family who'd moved to New Zealand.

One night, we went to a party where almost all were MD's. About ten of them were from South Africa.

They'd all moved to N.Z. because they to a person stated, it'd become to darn dangerous to live in South Africa.

Probably due to a growing number of people who believe this philosophy:
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/shelley ... _22036640/

[Oldgringo]

Has anyone read "Something of Value" by Robert Ruark. Yes, I know the book's setting is in Kenya but........

[Ruark]

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/shelley ... _22036640/

Holy crap. That is one of the scariest things I've ever read.

[philip964]

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/shelley ... _22036640/

Holy crap. That is one of the scariest things I've ever read.

Taken down. Do liberals actually have limits.

[Sport Coach]

My wife grew up in South Africa. Talked to a guy in SA a couple of years ago who fled with his family from Zimbabwe. Over there it's still more about territory, taking something tangible from someone. The bad guys (distinctly different than we think about here in the U.S.) tend to be hopped up on drugs and don't have value for life. It's not that they plan to do anything prosperous with what they take but rather they have it. South Africa right now is unfortunately seeing results of power struggle simply for the sake of having power, not for doing something better. Very unfortunate for a beautiful country that may soon be too unpredictable for travel. Yes, many from SA move to New Zealand or Australia.

[Keith B]

In 1998 my office in St. Louis was closing and consolidating with the one in Kansas City. I was open to follow my job, and was also offered several job opportunities in various locations with the company. One of those was a 2-3 year assignment in South Africa. The area I would have been in was between Pretoria and Johannesburg.

I was very interested as it would mean basically an immediate double promotion as well as a VERY large increase salary and perks. The company would have provided me and my family a car and driver, and the driver was a armed body guard. I would have been provided a very nice home in a gated and guarded golf course community with lots of other amenities. However, I wanted to make sure it was the right thing for my family before I accepted the position and locked in for that commitment, so started in-depth research of the country and what to expect.

It was just a few year post-Apartheid and it was very violent with tribal toyi-toyi's (violent political protests) still happening. There were also lots of muggings, robberies, rapes and murders and you would hear about them occurring close to you not daily, but hourly.

We talked to a friend who was there with her husband and family of two teen-aged children. The night before we talked they were eating dinner in a mall and someone was shot at the ATM right below them on the first floor. There had also been a string of armored car robberies over the previous year or so (233 in the first 9 months of 1997) by former soldiers from Umkhonto we Sizwe. These robbers would shoot peoples vehicles on the highway to disable them and block in the armored cars on the roads. Then they would come in and shoot-up the armored car killing the guards and make off with the money. Here is an article about that http://articles.latimes.com/1998/feb/07/news/mn-16411

In one of the robberies, one of our expatriate employees had their vehicle shot and it disabled the engine. Luckily the driver was sharp, realized what was happening and quickly moved the car out of the road as it coasted to a stop and the armored vehicle went on past them a ways before getting stopped and robbed.

Another event happened in the gated community where the VP I would have been working for lived. They were still building houses in the neighborhood and the workers had to check in and out at the guard post. In the mornings, they would count the number coming in in the vehicle. In the evening, they would count the number you had going out and search the vehicle. Since they weren't as diligent with their searches in the morning, there would be 2-3 people hiding in the van on the way in. In the evening, they would stay behind and wait until dark to steal and rob. A house across the street from my VP housed a family from Great Britain. The robbers thought the house was vacant, went in and the family was there. When confronted, the robbers killed the Father, Mother and 2 young children. :-(

After my research, I decided it was not the place my wife and I wanted to raise our 5 year old daughter, If she had been older to be more wary of her surroundings, or younger where she would not have been going off to school daily, we might have gone. But they are pretty vulnerable at that age. I chose an assignment in Dallas instead.

[philip964]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z58VXEVgp7

I guess the killing of white farmers one by one was not fast enough.

South African parliament votes to remove white South African farmers from their land without compensation.

The motion was brought by radical Marxist opposition leader Julius Malema.

"Mr Malema has a long-standing commitment to land confiscation without compensation. In 2016 he told his supporters he was 'not calling for the slaughter of white people - at least for now'."

"Rural affairs minister for the ruling African National Congress party said 'The ANC unequivocally supports the principle of land expropriation without compensation'."

"The deputy chief executive of civil rights group Afriforum said the motion was a violation of agreements made at the end of apartheid. "

I suspect there are some elderly people in South Africa who are saying "I told you so".

It would seem that only removing white farmers from their land without removing black farmers from their land would be racist.

Can anyone spell Zimbabwe?

In related news:

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/20 ... -confirme/

Chuck Schumer votes against a Trump judicial nominee because he is white.

[MaduroBU]

Everyone foolish enough to remain in South Africa is about to become a billionaire. Populists with no understanding of inflation are highly predictable creatures.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/ ... bwe.famine

[Abraham]

...and yet, I understand we 'give' them three hundred fifty million' a year.

Why?

[Paladin]

I haven't seen the documentary, but the trailer to the South African documentary Farmlands is disturbing.

[philip964]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/south-africa ... iness.html

A less inflammatory story on the confiscation.

Being done to equalize racial ownership.