The HSRC study found that there has been a dramatic increase in the number of cars being hijacked in the last year.

At the same time, the study also discovered that only 27% of people trust the police to get some kind of justice, while over 40% say if they catch a criminal suspect, they will not hand that person over to the police because it won’t lead to justice.

Senior research specialist in the Developmental, Capable and Ethical State (DCES) research division, Dr Steven Gordon says they believe a car is hijacked every 22 minutes in the country.

“The situation was slightly more dire when we conducted our survey, we found that 47%, almost half of the South African adult population, agreed with the statement that it's pointless to hand over a suspect to the police because they will not bring the offender to justice. 45% of the people now think it’s okay to take the law into their own hands,” Gordon says.

“People feel the police are not efficient at their jobs in reducing the level of crime. If we saw meaningful improvement and the efficiency of the police, we would see a level of trust. So there needs to be more attention paid to the impartiality of which the police treat the general public.”

SABC News