The New South Africa

welcome to the rainbow Nation............The African National Congress was accused on Wednesday of reintroducing racial categorisation, thereby polarising South African society. The National Democratic Convention (Nadeco) criticised the ruling party for not regarding coloured people as African. "This is nothing less than racialism and a callous disregard of the massive exploitation and oppression that the brown community in South Africa suffered in the apartheid past," the party said in a statement. "The mere fact that the ANC tries to categorise those disadvantaged as a result of the past in different groups, causes a new form of apartheid in South Africa." It was a case of "being too black in the past and now being too white", Nadeco said.
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Jabulani Mangane's brother was killed for his cell phone. He was drinking at the shebeen (a bar in a township). On his way home, about 1 Km from his home, he was stabbed to death by some robbers who stole his cell phone. Two suspects were arrested.



Source: The Daily Sun, 13 June 2006, Page 7

Johannesburg - An eight-months pregnant West Rand woman is out of danger after being shot by robbers while she and friends sat chatting around a table in their home on Sunday evening. Elize Fivaz, 23, of Lewisham near Krugersdorp is being treated in hospital and doctors are keeping an eye on her unborn daughter, Thalita. Fivaz went into labour shortly after the incident and doctors managed to stop the birth. Both mother and unborn daughter are out of danger. The child's father, Fanie du Toit, 41, says the bullet "penetrated Elize's side and not her stomach. "Elize is still attached to machines, because they're trying to stop the labour. Thalita is only expected to be born on August 20 or 22nd. "It seems as if Elize is coping better than me and she and our baby should be fine," Du Toit said. Louis Meiring, 35, and his fiancée, Cecilia Venter, 40, told how the two couples were attacked by three robbers shortly after they arrived home. Meiring said: "We sat in the kitchen. When we looked again, the robbers were there. They didn't say a word and just started shooting. I immediately pushed my fiancée to the floor. "I also grabbed Elize and fled with the women." Du Toit was wrestling with the robbers inside the house. Meiring and Venter only discovered a short while later that Fivaz had been shot. "She was very calm. The women and I went to the neighbours to contact the police and we heard shots in the house. I thought they had shot Fanie," Meiring said.Du Toit said it was "a blessing from above" that he wasn't shot, Shots were fired while he wrestled with the robbers for their firearm. "They told me, 'today we will kill you, you white pig'"

Gauteng residents increasingly vulnerable to attack at every turn

CRIMINALS are terrorising Gauteng residents as they step up attacks — stealing cars, emptying homes and robbing supermarkets.
Although police refuse to release crime statistics more recent than from a year ago, Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula admitted last week that crime, “particularly in Gauteng”, has increased.Security companies and Business Against Crime agree.
ADT security company told Metro that house robberies are up, and community policing forums and police reservists say so are hijackings. Supermarket robberies increased by 20% in May and June, compared with the same months last year, according to Business Against Crime.Barbara Holtmann, research group manager of crime prevention at the Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research, said it was undeniable that over the last two months there “has been a huge spike in violent crime”. “You don’t need to be a crime analyst to notice crime is atrocious at the moment. There’s a spike in all kinds of violent crime. We’ve seen the senseless violence, the murders of security guards, the murders on the freeways. It’s apparent that it’s out of control. “And with the cops also being killed, the stress on our police and on us is extraordinarily high,” she said. “Women become depressed and anxious. Men become angry and seek revenge. It shows in road rage, the kind of pressure people are under. People are losing it.” André Snyman from crime-awareness group E-Blockwatch said: “Crime is just going ballistic at the moment. Criminals are encouraged by the successes of other criminals.” In the Cleveland precinct, east of the Joburg city centre, 12 hijackings were reported in May, mainly in the suburb of Kensington. In June, 13 hijackings were reported in the Cleveland area, compared with three in the same month last year.Criminals are devising crafty ways to attack. The latest attempts at forcing cars to stop include throwing eggs at them, causing bumper bashings, and placing dolls on roads to fool motorists into thinking they are injured babies. On June 30, E-Blockwatch reported eggs were thrown at a luxury vehicle on Rivonia Road. At the beginning of the year, the same happened to a car travelling to Lanseria Airport. Both drivers escaped being hijacked by continuing driving.E-Blockwatch and vehicle recovery firm Tracker say criminals cause bumper bashings on highway offramps. “Once you have pulled over and climbed out, thinking you’ve just had an accident, you are hijacked,” said Gareth Crocker, Tracker communications manager.Crocker and Snyman have also reported hijackers placing rocks or other objects in the road — common at the Grasmere Toll Plaza south of Joburg and on the R21 near Benoni. Tracker, which handles 100 hijackings a month, has released a list of hotspots that includes Commissioner Street in the CBD, Bramley’s Louis Botha Avenue, Benoni’s Snake Road, Honeydew’s Beyers Naudé Drive, the southern section of the Golden Highway, Church Street in Pretoria, Eikenhof’s Old Vereeniging Road, Ridgeway’s Rifle Range Road, Alberton’s Voortrekker Road and Witkoppen Road in Fourways.However, Crocker warned that by far the most common hijacking spot was one’s home.“Two-thirds of all car hijackings reported to Tracker occur either when people are arriving or leaving home,” he said. “Many hijackers lie in wait either behind a tree or a bush next to your driveway.”ADT spokesman Penny Formo said Gauteng was experiencing an increase in armed robberies at houses. Supermarkets have also been hit hard. There were 94 supermarket robberies in Gauteng in the first five months of the year, representing 70% of the 135 supermarket robberies that occurred in the whole country.This means as many as five supermarkets in Gauteng are robbed each week. Kenny Fihla, chief executive of Business Against Crime, said while bank robberies have decreased, supermarket robberies have increased as criminals migrate from banks to supermarkets. “Four years ago, it was unheard of for robbers to target shopping centres with AK-47s,” he said.

Pieter Malan, Beeld


London - South Africa's preparations for the 2010 soccer World Cup tournament are far behind schedule, according to an article in the German weekly Der Spiegel.

The SA authorities are so disorganised that the left hand does not know what the right hand is doing, the newspaper reported.

In Germany, planning was so advanced four years before the 2006 World Cup tournament that the officials knew precisely which streets would be closed before matches, the weekly, the largest in Europe, reported at the weekend.

However, "in Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town chaos and confusion are the order of the day at the moment," according to the article.

Der Spiegel reports that Delron Buckley, a South African playing in the Bundesliga, said South Africa was completely behind schedule and had not built or repaired anything.

Members of the German organising committee told the weekly they had had several visits from the SA delegation but that the South Africans would not listen to advice. "I have to start at the beginning every time," a German official said.

According to the report many German soccer officials are starting to believe that the only way to save the 2010 tournament would be to send members of the German committee to South Africa to get things in order.

This, apparently, is a view shared by some South Africans. According to the report, Mpumalanga premier Thabang Makwetla said during a recent visit to Germany the 2010 tournament would be "Germany's next tournament".

Der Spiegel reports that Danny Jordaan, the chief of the SA organising committee, professes, as could be expected, that everything is in order.

Jordaan told the publication that he did not want to elaborate upon the progress made in South Africa because he did not want to steal the limelight from the tournament in Germany while it was still in progress.

Fifa, the body controlling world soccer, should bear some of the blame because "they have created their own version of the reality," the report says.

Der Spiegel alleges that Fifa's progress reports about the 2010 tournament do not reflect the reality.

The reports refer to suburban train systems that are very popular but do not keep in mind that no other significant transport systems exist and that mini-buses are old and dangerous.

The SA authorities have also admitted that the planned Gautrain, an express train between Johannesburg and Pretoria, will not be completed by 2010.

And to make things worse, the South Africans are playing poor soccer and cannot really justify their participation in the 2010 tournament, according to the report.

I came across This site...

http://deathofjohannesburg.blogspot.com

Features photos of Jo'Burg.......Welcome to the New South Africa

For those outside South Africa these photos display areas in Jo'Burg that were quite nice 10 years ago. Great Job ANC.

The Chelsea Hotel, Hillbrow: a formerly popular hotel, now boarded up

This ws posted on Crimepages.co.za and I find it incomprehensible the brutality of the current South African Criminals. Maybe it is a good thing that the World Cup will be in South Africa as outsiders will be exposed to such brutality.  

Leslie - "Please don't shoot me. Take my cell phone," a 10-year-old pleaded with an attacker who had shot dead an elderly relative in front of her on a farm outside Leslie. Police have arrested a man in connection with the death of 72-year-old Sylvia Barkhuizen at the weekend. She was shot dead in front of the child, on Kruisement farm outside Leslie in Mpumalanga on Friday night. Barkhuizen apparently was shot dead with her son's firearm, stolen from his home earlier that day. André Barkhuizen, who farmed Kruisement with his mother, said: "This is very, very difficult." He said his mother took several farm workers to town on Friday afternoon to do shopping, and she returned shortly afterwards. Minutes after she and the child, who had been visiting her since Wednesday, got out of the bakkie, they were attacked by the man. He apparently dragged Barkhuizen to the back of the bakkie and shot her twice - in the head and the stomach and she died within seconds. The killer grabbed the shocked child and threw her on to Barkhuizen's body. André Barkhuizen said: "The murderer searched through her pockets and just walked away." He apparently saw the girl picking up her cellphone and dialling a number to contact her father in Brits. The girl's father, who may not be identified to protect her, said: "I heard her yelling that Mrs Barkhuizen had been shot and, all of a sudden, everything was quiet." The girl pleaded with the attacker: "Please don't shoot me. Take my cellphone," when he lunged at her while she was talking on it. He grabbed the cellphone and ran away. The girl's father immediately contacted André Barkhuizen, who was on holiday in Durban. He dialled his mother's cellphone number.When the girl heard the cellphone ringing, she apparently had to lift up the body to reach the cellphone. André Barkhuizen said: "I told her to look for the keys to the vehicle. "She found the keys and I told her to get in and lock all the doors and not to open them for anyone." Two of Barkhuizen's neighbours found the blood-smeared girl cowering in the bakkie. Captain Manie van Zyl, commander of the unit against serious crime in Middelburg, has confirmed that they've arrested a man near Leandra. They found a pistol, allegedly the gun used in the attack, as well as jewellery, in his possession. Barkhuizen said several relatives of the arrested man had worked on the farm for years.

 
Sylvia Barhuizen, 72, who was shot dead on her farm near Leslie in the Free State.