Johannesburg - A spike in violent street robberies committed by thugs who drive cars has university students and the communities of Westdene and Sophiatown fearing for their lives.
The modus operandi of the criminals is to prey mainly on students who live in student accommodation in these two Joburg suburbs.
On Thursday, a student, believed to be from the University of Johannesburg, landed in hospital after two thugs attacked him on 1st Avenue in Westdene. Witnesses said the male student had been walking along when a silver Toyota Camry pulled up next to him at about 11.30am near the quiet Ludlow Street.
“I saw a car with two male passengers making a U-turn in front of my house and follow the boy, who didn’t seem to be aware that he was being followed. The next thing I heard him screaming and moments later, the two passengers came back from the corner and casually walked to their idling vehicle.
“They didn’t seem nervous or in a hurry at all,” said an elderly Westdene resident, who wanted to remain anonymous.
The student was found lying on the side of the road with about five stab wounds to his upper body, apparently inflicted with a screwdriver, and taken to hospital. He was robbed of his laptop and cellphone.
Construction workers on Ludlow Street said the robbers looked professional and well-organised.
“Everything happened so quickly. They were wearing matching uniforms to appear as if they were workers, in order to dupe their potential victim,” said one worker.
The incident is one of many to have happened in the student suburb where pedestrians are targeted by mobile thugs.
This week, a video of a parked tuk-tuk driver being robbed by armed occupants of a Toyota Etios in Westdene circulated on social media. In the video, two men alight from the Toyota and approach the tuk-tuk.
One of them sticks his head into the driver’s side and pulls out a bag, believed to have contained R26000 in cash. He then walks back to his vehicle and speeds off with his accomplice.
In September, a video of a female student, Noxolo Ntuli, fighting off her attackers who wanted to steal her laptop in Auckland Park, became a social media hit.
The video was captured on CCTV camera. It shows Ntuli, a master’s student, walking alone when suddenly a black car pulls up to her.
Three occupants charge at her, before attempting to grab her handbag containing a draft of her thesis. But she hangs on to it until they give up and speed off.
In a more brazen attack in March, two gun-wielding thugs invaded UJ’s laboratory on Kings-
way and robbed several students of their laptops and iPads. The attack ended in gunshots being exchanged between the robbers and campus security guards.
The culprits escaped, but the attack spread fear on the campus.
Thursday’s stabbing occurred in the wake of the latest crime statistics released by the Police Ministry, which showed an 8% spike in armed robberies in Gauteng - from 49702 to 53793 in 2016/17.
This translates into 147 violent crimes being committed daily in the province.
@lindilesifile