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Eastern Cape police management says it's satisfied that overall the police have succeeded in bringing contact crime down by 20%.
Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa released the annual crime statistics which showed a decrease in the murder rate country-wide.
The Eastern Cape, however, bucked the trend with gang related violence contributing to the province's high murder rate.
Eastern Cape police spokesperson, brigadier Marinda Mills, says they're also concerned at the spike in house and business robberies, particularly at foreign-owned spaza shops.
"Here we see that they are being targeted 35% of the time, mostly because foreign owned business has a high cash flow and there are poor security measures in place so we are targeting and focusing on putting better mechanisms in place to assist these members of the public" Mills said
