Pretoria - The daughter of Efficient Group chief economist Dawie Roodt has described how her father bravely fought off one of the men who threatened his family, almost losing his arm in the incident.
Speaking to the Pretoria News on Friday night, Danielle Roodt said they would not have survived the robbery had it not been for her father.
The 24-year-old said three gun-wielding assailants accosted her on Thursday night as she arrived at her father’s Faerie Glen home.
The robbers were armed with a revolver, a panga and a hunting a knife.
She said it wasn’t clear how they managed to gain access to their home, but she was confronted by one of the robbers at gunpoint after she parked her car in the garage.
“He instructed me to get out of the car and asked me if the rest of my family were home. They took me inside where they rounded up my father, stepmom and my little twin sisters and tied us up in the study,” she said.
The three robbers then ransacked their house.
“They gagged us and blindfolded us with linen while they searched for money,” Danielle said.
For once, Eskom’s load shedding was a blessing as the lights went out. The trio became nervous and demanded money.
“My dad said he had money in his car, which was parked in the garage outside. One of the robbers went to the garage with my dad and was struggling to open the door. That’s when my dad managed to free himself from the zip-ties and wrestle with the robber.
“They got into a fist fight before the robber pulled out his knife and stabbed my father on his arm,” she said.
The robber fled after her father shouted to their neighbours for help.
“The other two who were in the house grabbed some stuff and also ran away. We managed to loosen ourselves and ran to look for my dad. The garage floor was covered with blood. I helped him into my car and drove him to a nearby hospital,” Danielle said.
Among the items stolen were cellphones, iPads, laptops and external hard drives.
She said her father was recovering well in the Netcare Pretoria East Hospital after undergoing surgery on Thursday night. He is due to undergo more surgery tomorrow.
As for for the rest of the family, they were traumatised but not physically harmed.
“We are all very tired, but very grateful that we are safe,” she said.
Roodt was an economist at the South African Reserve Bank for nine years and was economic editor of Financial Week and Finweek.
Police spokeswoman Lieutenant-Colonel Katlego Mogale said the matter was being investigated and no arrests had been made.
Pretoria News