DEAD GROUND: War on the Cape Flats | News24

After years of escalating gang violence on South Africa's Cape Flats, President Cyril Ramaphosa deploys the South African National Defence Force. Three weeks later, another teenager is shot dead while soldiers patrol five minutes away.

DEAD GROUND is a News24 documentary that traces the roots of an escalating gang war and examines whether soldiers trained for combat can resolve a crisis forged by decades of poverty, displacement, and institutional neglect.

Through the voices of the Cape Flats – a gang member, grieving mothers on both sides of the crossfire, a coach who shaped young lives through discipline, and a pastor whose ceasefire programme once quieted the streets – the film reveals a crisis with known solutions that remain unfunded.

0:00 - Welcome to Hanover Park
0:35 - Gangs splinter, the Cape Flats bleeds
7:43 - The State Responds
9:16 - Soldiers arrive, the killing continues
10:04 - The world the army enters
18:50 - The human cost
23:07 - Meaning of a name
26:15 - Interrupting the cycle of violence
28:16 - What the violence leaves behind

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