Cape Town - In a David and Goliath-like battle, a Metrorail commuter has claimed victory against the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) after the Western Cape High Court found the parastatal was negligent.
It awarded Masibulele Rautini full damages for the serious injuries he sustained after being thrown off a fast-moving train.
Unemployed Rautini had taken on Prasa for the personal injuries sustained when he was flung out of a train while travelling to work from Du Toit to Lynedoch station in Stellenbosch in 2011.
Three men armed with a gun and knife had stormed the train and demanded passengers’ cellphones and wallets, Rautini told the court.
He and other passengers had tried moving away from the suspects when one of them, armed with a knife, blocked his way and pushed him out of the open train door following a scuffle, Rautini testified.
He sustained a head injury, multiple fractures to his legs and a fracture to his neck.
Yesterday, Rautini, 27, told the Cape Times the incident had shattered his dreams.
At the time of the incident he was 21 and a gardener at Spier Wine Estate.
However, he is still recovering from the incident.
“I am relieved that this has come to a conclusion. But all my dreams were shattered.
“I could no longer work after the incident. It was painful then and is still painful even today.
“I was a gardener then and getting something at the end of the day, but after the incident I could not get anything. My health took a knock.
“I use to be in a wheelchair but I am now on crutches. I can only walk short distances,” he said.
Rautini’s legal team says the case will now continue to determine the full extent of his losses in order to compensate for the treatment costs, both in the past and those to come, his loss of income, as well as general damages for his pain and suffering and loss of amenities of life.
According to the court papers, Rautini charged that Prasa’s breach of its duty of care amounted to negligence in that it allowed the train to travel between stations without ensuring the doors were closed.
He alleged Prasa failed to maintain the train doors adequately, or at all, and that it failed to keep the commuters on the train under any protocol, alternatively under any proper control.
He said Prasa failed to post security guards on the train when they should, and could have done so, adding that it failed to avoid the incident when, by the exercise of reasonable care, could and should have done so.
Prasa had not denied Rautini’s charge that it had a duty of care for its passenger.
However, the state-owned entity contended it did not breach its duty of care, was not negligent and that Rautini was “the sole cause of the incident”.
Acting Judge Janet McCurdie said the records upon which Prasa relied did not support the conclusion that Rautini jumped from the train.
“At best, they confirm the fact of Rautini falling from a moving train,” she said.
“Although there were a number of factors at play on the day in question, at the end of the day, one is left with the fact that the train was in motion with open doors, making travel for passengers unsafe,” she said.
Judge McCurdie said Prasa failed to ensure that the doors of the trains were closed at all times when the train was in motion; to ensure that passengers in general and Rautini, in particular, would not fall from or be pushed out of a moving train.
“In my view, Prasa’s conduct was indeed negligent. Had the doors of the train been closed, Rautini would not have been able to be pushed out of the train,” she said.
Kirstie Haslam, partner at DSC Attorneys, the firm representing Rautini, said the ruling would assist future plaintiffs where hospital records and entries made by Prasa’s own staff did not fully accord with the plaintiff’s version, as was the case in this instance.
“We are immensely pleased with the fact that the plaintiff’s version, which has remained consistent throughout the years and was heavily contested under cross-examination, was preferred over entries made in written records by hospital staff and by Prasa’s own staff.”
Prasa spokesperson Nana Zenani did not respond to questions by the time of publishing.