Multiple shooters killed 12 people and injured 9 in a nighttime attack in South Africa

More than 10 attackers got off a bus and drove through a poor neighborhood in a major South African city when they opened fire on residents in an incident that killed 12 people and injured nine, police said on Wednesday.

This shooting incident, which happened after 11 o’clock at night on Tuesday in the slums of Cleveland, Johannesburg, has signs of gangs fighting to control mining or other illegal activities, although the police said they are still investigating.

Police said the shooters were dropped off at the scene and “walked around the area, opened fire on residents and members of the public in several areas before fleeing the scene in one vehicle.”

Nine men and three women were killed, according to the police. 11 died at the scene and one died at the hospital.

A search was launched for the attackers, but no arrests have been made, the police said.

Slums in South Africa are informal settlements common in and around major cities where people seeking housing live in shacks or other temporary structures.

Ambulances were at the scene on Wednesday morning to carry the bodies, while other members of the public crowded the streets in groups.

South Africa has seen many mass shootings, including two in December that killed more than 20 people. Some of these attacks also involved multiple shooters.

Mass shootings in South Africa are often linked to gangs. In Johannesburg, violent criminals are involved in illegal mining in and around the city, which has large gold fields and many abandoned mines. Gangs set up operations in those mines to claim the surplus for illegal trade.

They are famous for fighting violent wars with warring gangs or other killings to try to strengthen their control over territories.

The attackers were ‘heartless,’ the official said

Cleveland is an area linked to illegal mining, said a member of the local council, although he added that there are other problems in the area including land disputes between different sections of the local community and that illegal mining gangs are not the cause of these killings.

“There are a lot of moving parts here so it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what’s causing the problems,” said council member Neuren Pietersen in an interview with eNCA television station at the scene.

The police deployed intelligence officers at the scene, according to police spokesperson Athlenda Mathe. The provincial police commissioner, Tommy Mthombeni, said the attackers were “heartless” but refused to link the killings with illegal mining until the investigation is complete.

South Africa has one of the highest violent crime rates, recording more than 23,000 murders in the last financial year, according to official crime statistics, an average of more than 60 a day.

The occurrence of illegal mining in and around Johannesburg is one of the factors that led the government in March to send troops to certain high-risk areas in a campaign to curb violence linked to organized crime.

That move by the Government was seen as an acknowledgment that the police are being defeated in other parts of the country where violent gangs operate.