A 52-year-old man from Khayelitsha who was injured when a Golden Arrow bus ploughed into his shack during a service delivery protest has died. His partner and their 12-year-old son are fighting for their lives in hospital.
Golden Arrow driver Sandile Hoko, 67, was killed on Friday night when his bus crashed into four shacks after being stoned by protesters in Khayelitsha. Thirty passengers were hurt.
Among the injured were Daniel Sass, his partner, Irene Lamont, 38, and their son, Themba, who were sleeping in their shack.
On Tuesday, builders were hard at work rebuilding the four structures, while Lamont’s 22-year-old daughter, Thembeka, looked on.
She told the Cape Argus that they had lost everything, including her parents’ IDs.
“My heart is sore, I have lost my stepdad, and my mom and brother are hurt really bad. My mother had an operation on the head… Doctors say her ribs are broken, she is not talking or eating… she doesn’t even know that Daniel has died,” she said.
Sass died on Monday morning.
Thembeka said she left her mother and stepdad sleeping in their bedroom on Friday, and her brother on the couch watching TV. While she was standing on the other side of the road at a neighbour’s house, she saw the bus “come flying off the road. The next thing, children were running in all directions. It came to a standstill in the middle of our shack”.
On Tuesday, members of the ANC Dullah Omar region, including chairman Xolani Sotashe, visited Thembeka and other residents affected by the crash. They also stopped at Hoko’s home in Gugulethu to give condolences to his daughter, Lisa, and friends of the family.
Sotashe told the families that they would not rest until whoever was responsible for the crash was brought to book.
“Hoko… was attacked by a member of the community. We are here to investigate and distance ourselves and the ANC Youth League from the incident, as rumours are flying around that we were responsible,” he said. “We are not going to stoop low and politicise people’s pain like how the premier and the mayor of the Western Cape have done.”
The city and provincial government have offered a R50 000 reward for information about those responsible for stoning the bus.
Cape Argus