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The streets of Daveyton (on the east rand of Johannesburg) are no longer as safe as they used to be. The community has tried to deal with the many safety issues they are being faced with. At first the biggest issue was gangsterism: there were gangs that terrorised the whole community. In response, the community set up a patrol team. They risked their lives to try and fight these boys who were causing problems. But the patrol team had to stop because now their lives were in danger because of a new trend of human trafficking. Male or female, young and old, perpatrators don’t care, they take. The community of Daveyton has started fearing for their lives and have stopped patrolling.
“I was walking with my friends one night, and a strange car came to us and tried to abduct us,” said Gugu Nyaweni (19). The car approached them and the men inside it wanted to get the young group of women’s numbers. But the group did not want to entertain them. The men in the car then tried to advertise “perfume”.
When Gugu and her friends refused the car stopped, they ran and one guy came out of the car and ran after them. Fortunately they were too fast for him and they managed to escape. Gugu believes that had they gone to ‘smell the perfume’, they would be gone by now where no one was going to find them. It has been reported that the thing they call ‘perfumes’ is what is being used to drug people and make them unconscious so by the time you wake up it’s too late.
In another incident a VW Golf was reported to be involved in human trafficking and the community tried to corner and stop the car and its occupant. But the driver escaped aby reversing his car straight into the cars trying to stop him. When they saw that he was going to crash into their cars they quickly moved out of the way and he escaped.
Another report claims kidnappers sometimes say to children that they have won an iPhone knowing that they will easily get tempted and get into to the kidnapper’s car. These children are murdered, and their body parts are used for ‘muthi’. Other reports claim that people are being kidnapped to be organ-donors on the black market.
People are now encouraged to move in groups and protect one another.
This article was submitted on 1 October 2020. You may republish this article, so long as you credit the authors and Karibu! Online (www.Karibu.org.za), and do not change the text. Please include a link back to the original article.
