Every so often, a statistic emerges that should force an entire public debate to pause and reconsider its assumptions.

The latest parliamentary figures on firearm murders in South Africa appear to do exactly that. But they also expose something equally troubling: the government cannot yet provide a clear and internally consistent account of the evidence on which it is advancing new firearm legislation.

In a written parliamentary reply dated 21 July 2026, Police Minister Firoz Cachalia stated that 41 297 people were murdered using unlicensed firearms during the four financial years from 2022/23 to 2025/26. During the same period, according to the reply, 393 people were murdered using a legal firearm in the hands of a licensed owner. Taken at face value, that means slightly more than 99% of firearm murders involved unlicensed weapons.

That figure should fundamentally change the emphasis of South Africa’s gun debate. It points overwhelmingly towards illegal firearms, criminal supply networks, and failed enforcement, not towards the licensed hunter, sport shooter, collector, dealer or ordinary citizen who has been vetted, fingerprinted, competency-tested, and approved by the state.

We are, however, required to look beyond the headline numbers. Only seven days later, in a separate parliamentary reply, the minister stated that the legal status of firearms used in criminal killings could not be ascertained. That reply also recorded, as a separate category, people who died in incidents involving licensed firearm owners acting in self-defence. The government must explain how these two replies relate to one another.

How was the legal status of more than 41 000 firearms established in the first reply if, according to the second, the status of firearms used in criminal killings cannot be ascertained? Do the 393 cases involving legally licensed firearms include lawful acts of self-defence? Were all the incidents finally adjudicated, or were they classified according to the status of the initial police docket? What databases were used and were the figures independently reconciled? These are not minor technical questions. They go directly to the rationality of the policy process.

If the figure is accurate, it confirms that the overwhelming source of firearm murder lies outside the licensed community, and that the present policy emphasis is badly misplaced. If the figure cannot withstand scrutiny, the government has no business advancing far-reaching restrictions on the strength of statistics it cannot properly explain.

Either way, the case for transparency has become stronger. The state cannot credibly present the licensed firearm owner as the central public-safety problem while thousands of official weapons disappear, illegal firearms dominate firearm murders, criminal trafficking networks remain active and the institutions responsible for enforcement struggle to account for their own armouries.

The Firearms Control Amendment Bill is being advanced through an opaque process in the National Economic Development and Labour Council (NEDLAC). The government says the 2021 draft attracted approximately 118 000 submissions and that further consultations took place before the Bill was referred to NEDLAC. It has also indicated that, after NEDLAC, the Bill is intended to proceed through the relevant government structures before being introduced into Parliament.

Yet affected stakeholders have repeatedly requested the statistics, research, meeting records, identities of participants, and other material forming the factual foundation of the Bill. Outdoor Investment Holdings has formally requested precisely this information, together with a meaningful opportunity to participate in the process.

In April, the Civilian Secretariat for Police Service acknowledged before Parliament that further research was required to determine whether South Africa’s firearm-related problems arise from shortcomings in the legislation or failures in its implementation. At the same time, official planning documents indicate that the government intends to introduce the Amendment Bill before the end of the 2026/27 financial year. It would seem the government wants to craft the law before the rationale for it has been proved.

Before changing the law, the government should establish what the actual problem is. Before imposing new restrictions on regulated citizens, it should identify the source of the harm it seeks to prevent. Before claiming that consultation has occurred, it should disclose the evidence and engage meaningfully with the people, industries and institutions that will have to live with the consequences.

South Africa does not suffer from an absence of firearm regulation. The existing Firearms Control Act already imposes extensive requirements relating to competency, licensing, background checks, safe storage, transfers, renewals, and record-keeping. The deeper failure lies in administration and enforcement: dysfunctional registry systems, unresolved backlogs, weak tracing capacity, inadequate control of state firearms, poor investigation of illegal supply networks, and criminal prosecutions that too often fail or stall.

There is, nevertheless, reason for cautious optimism.

The language of institutional reform is now coming from the government itself. In his 2026/27 budget address, Cachalia committed the government to what he described as a bold police “reset agenda”, aimed at building a modern, professional and trusted police service. The Madlanga Commission is meanwhile continuing its investigation into criminality, political interference, and corruption within the criminal justice system.

That reset is necessary, but it must begin with the real failures: illegal firearm trafficking, corruption, state armoury control, dysfunctional databases, weak investigation, poor tracing, and inconsistent prosecution.

The reported 99% figure should not end every possible debate about firearm policy. No single statistic should. It should, however, end the pretence that licensed firearm owners have been shown to be the central cause of South Africa’s firearm-murder crisis. And the contradictions in government’s own replies should end the practice of attempting to legislate first and establish the facts afterwards.

The government should publish the underlying data, and it must reconcile its parliamentary replies. It should complete the research that has been commissioned and disclose the factual basis of the Amendment Bill, while at the same time opening the process to genuine engagement with affected stakeholders. Until that happens, further restrictions on lawful firearm owners cannot credibly be presented as evidence-based public-safety reform. They remain a legislative response in search of a properly diagnosed problem.

Marco van Niekerk is Group Chief Executive Officer of Outdoor Investment Holdings, the largest formal importer, distributor and retailer in South Africa’s firearms sector.