Johannesburg - Quick action by a truck driver helped him escape a hijacking.
He had been transporting cigarettes worth R180 000 early on Tuesday morning when he noticed that several vehicles were following him.
Suspecting that the group were about to make an attempt to stop his truck and hijack his cargo, he contacted his boss, who instructed him to stop at the nearest police station.
The driver then took a detour to Brackendowns police station.
As soon as the drivers in the other vehicles realised where he was heading, they went a different way.
The articulated truck was so big that it took up most of the parking space at the station. The large boxes containing cigarettes were stacked on top of one another and stretched across two trailers. Ropes and other fastening equipment that were used to hold the boxes in place - estimated to weigh about 100kg each - lay on the ground near the truck.
The rare sight caused passers-by to stop in their tracks for a better look, but they were prevented from getting too close. They attempted to question the officers about the truck’s contents.
Police spokeswoman Lieutenant-Colonel Katlego Mogale, who was at the scene, said the driver was carrying the load from the Beit Bridge border post in Limpopo to Pretoria, and “as soon as the suspects realised they were coming towards a police station, they disappeared”.
Through a joint operation between members of the SAPS and officers from the Gauteng Traffic Crime Prevention Unit, three people were taken in for questioning.
A source close to the investigation said a Mercedes-Benz C180 was also seized during the operation.
Mogale said the police were looking into the particulars of the vehicle as it was believed to be a rental car.
The Star