HIGH calibre ammunition, possibly linked to an intended heist or assassination hit, was recovered by special police units at the Empangeni bus rank on Saturday.
Members of the Empangeni Crime Intelligence and SAPS Operational Response Services division had received information regarding two men from the Ntambanana area who were on their way to hand over the ammunition to an unknown party at the rank.
Dressed as civilians, the police walked on foot inside the rank and identified the two criminals, one of whom was carrying a red bag.
As they closed in to make the arrest, the men ran and as the police gave chase they dropped the bag.
They jumped into a white VW Polo with GP registration which was parked next to the Hillview robots and drove away in the direction of Matshana reserve.
A chase failed to locate the suspects.
The bag was opened by the police, who recovered 83 rounds of live ammunition comprising:
• 50 x 7.65 mm pistol rounds
• 13 x 7.65 mm pistol hollow point rounds
• 9 x R1 assault rifle rounds
• 11 x R5 automatic assault rifle rounds.
‘It is clear that someone or some people were going to be assassinated with this ammunition and it shows clearly that those criminals are armed and dangerous,’ said one police member.
‘This type of discovery is worrying because R1 and R5 rifles belong to the police, while R5 ammunition is also used for LM 5 semi-automatic rifles carried by security guards on taxi violence teams.’
