Protesters marched to the Parliament on Saturday against the proposed ban on firearm ownership for self-defence.
The Civilian Secretariat for Police Service recently called for public comment on the Firearms Control Amendment Bill that seeks to remove self-defence as a reason to own a firearm.
Protesters handed over their memorandum of demands during the demonstration. They said the bill hinders the constitutional and humanitarian rights of citizens to defend themselves.
The organiser of the Firearm Freedom Run march, Brent van der Westhuizen said if the bill goes through it would take away the freedom of self-defence as well as the freedom to choose.
The City of Cape Town’s JP Smith accepted the memorandum of demands.
Smith said that the City was also against the bill.
“Proposing this, we think it’s a fundamental problem if the police are not in the position to protect the citizenry and you then deny or deprive the public of their right of that opportunity that they have now to effect that self-defence. The police budget is going to be significantly decreased over the next three years, and difficult and challenging as our current situation is now, it is unlikely to get better,” he said.
The public has until 4 July to submit comments on the draft bill.