It was routine for homeowners to hire armed nightwatchmen. In Nigeria, we had a Touareg guy, with a scimitar. In Morocco, our neighbor had guys with machine guns (which meant we didn’t need much more than a wall), but we lived in a nice area. Our neighbor had some relation to the King. In Uganda, our watchman had a staff (and a holstered pistol).
South Africa has so much crime, that even the poorest neighborhoods have broken-glass walls.
And, I'm not the one saying it. Nigeria routinely purges thousands of ghost officers from salary rosters and recently claimed it had 80k ghost cops. In a country of 200 million. So, it's a no-brainer why private security is a better deal once you have the means. They're available 24/7 and often have guns, and backup, and other tech.
This was shortly after the Westgate Shopping Mall attack. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westgate_shopping_mall_attack
That was probably a cop in plainclothes. Private citizens don't open-carry as a matter of course in Kenya.