Johannesburg Metropolitan police  have made seven arrests following attacks on concert goers leaving an event marking the centenary of the birth of Nelson Mandela.

Scores of people were robbed of mobile phones, wallets and handbags by youths who attacked people desperate to get away from the iconic FNB stadium in Johannesburg, built to host the 2010 Football World Cup.

Many were assaulted and stabbed.

Police Minister Bheki Cele refused to accept criticism for the failure of the South African Police Service to protect people leaving the event.

Faced with outraged social media reaction, police have sought DSTV footage from a petrol station near the stadium where many of the attacks took place.

Question one

Who was responsible to security at the stadium?

First and foremost the South African National Police Service. They were nowhere to be seen when youth waiting at a petrol station near the stadium made several forays into the crowd of people waiting for lifts and taxis. The robbers armed with knives acted with impu

Question two

How did Police Minister Bheki Cele try to exonerate his members?

He said the SAPS cannot be blamed for people not organizing taxis. Security outside the stadium  is the responsibility of the concern organizers, he says 

Question three

Has there been any reaction from senior police  officers?

SANPS spokesman Vish Naidoo says there were police outside the stadium. He denies that police left the venue immediately the concert ended.

Question four

This was clearly a massive event. Who was on the bill?

Beyoncé, Ed Sherren, Eddie Vedder, Jay-Z and Usher

Question five 

Is it impossible to control people attending  events at the stadium?

There have been no reports of such attacks on people leaving football; matches. There were, however, incidents  of mugging and assaults following the Guns ’n Roses Concert at FNB stadium three days earlier .

Question six

Will this impact on the elections approaching in South Africa next year?

Since Johannesburg falls under control of the Democratic Alliance, it is bound to become a political football. The municipal police and not the national police acted immediately and made arrests. Lawlessness is a major preoccupation of urban voters so this is bound to come up at the hustings.

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He was not injured  but police statistics indicate he was one of nearly 17,000 victims of this particular violent crime this past year in a country where more than 50 people are murdered every day.

Thirty-seven-year-old Solly Msimanga has been mayor of the Tshwane metropole, which incorporates the capital city of Pretoria, since the opposition Democratic Alliance won local elections in 2016.

He says two armed men approached him when he left a restaurant and demanded the keys to his silver Mercedes Benz.

He believes he was lucky they did not try to take him as a hostage.

Msimanga says he was shaken by the incident but believes he was fortunate to have escape unharmed.

His car was armed with a tracker system that enabled authorities to track it down before it stopped working.

Carjackers have in the past taken children strapped into their safety seats when they sped away in stolen vehicles.

Violent crime is rife in South Africa.

Last year’s official crime statistics say 16 717 carhackings were reported.

That/s the highest number in the past decade.

South Africa’s murder rate is currently 52 people a day.

Per capita that’s thhehe eight highest in the world.

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Ferguson says she was motivated by the #me too movement of women naming their violators.

Danny Jordaan headed the organizing body for the 2010 Football World Cup in South Africa.

He was Mayor of Nelson Mandela metropole until was ousted by the opposition Democratic Alliance two years ago.

He’s not responded to Jennifer Ferguson’s allegation.

Ferguson fell foul of the apartheid regime for opposing conscription and supporting those forced to fight against the liberation forces.

Her activism was recognized by then ANC leader Nelson Mandela who put her on the ruling party’s list to become an MP.

She says she was in her hotel room celebrating this when Danny Jordaan entered and raped her.

Dazed and confused, she failed to report this because she feared it might be though she had provoked the attack.

Speaking from Sweden, where she now lives, Ferguson says there is something in South Africa where the wounded male psyche is expressing itself violently.

She says South Africa’s had a scourge of rape and child abuse since colonial times.

She feels she’s part of a much bigger collective need for truth in order to heal and forgive,

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South Africa’s Appeal Court has reserved judgment in the matter as Zuma’s counsel seeks to take the eight-year legal battle all the way back to the beginning.

President Jacob Zuma and the National Prosecuting Authority appealed a High Court decision last year that dropping the charges against Zuma was irrational.

At the start of proceedings yesterday, Zuma’s counsel Kemp J Kemp made the shock admission that the decision by the then prosecuting authority head  Mokotedi Mpshe was based on the wrong statute.

Mpshe found that there were political motives for trying  Zuma on the charges relating to the 1999 arms procurement deal by the African National Congress government

However Kemp maintains that if the court  accepts this, the prosecution authority has to have an opportunity to make the correct decision.

This would put the matter into the hands  of the existing prosecution authority director Shaun Abrahams.

Constitutional law expert Pierre de Vos says Zuma’s making another bid to get corruption charges dropped and he’s confident he’ll get a sympathetic ear from Abrahams.

The Democratic Alliance , who took the matter to the High Court, says it will resume its legal battle if Zuma manages to dodge further court action.

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The EFF members, sporting their red overalls or maids uniforms traded punches with security staff as they were manhandled from the house by security staff.

Guests of MPs in the public gallery were left weeping with pepper spray as the battle raged below between lawmakers who called President Jacob Zuma a constitutional delinquent and security staff.

The Economic Freedom Fighters  maintain Zuma broke his oath of office by defying the public protector’s order to repay money taken from the public purse to pay for improvements to his private home.

Speaker Baleka Mbete has ordered an investigation of what she called an unacceptable security breach.

The opposition Democratic Alliance led by Mmusi Maimane also left the chamber.

He said the behavior of the ANC government was worse than that of apartheid leader P.W. Botha

When President Jacob Zuma eventually took to the podium after a 90 minute delay he spoke of the need for a radical economic transformation in South Africa to right the imbalance that existed 23 years after the dawn of democracy.

Zuma says less than five percent of property in South Africa is owned by blacks

He says government will use every means in its power to achieve this transformation.

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His grandson is calling on the National Electoral Commission to force the opposition Democratic Alliance to take down an advertisement, using the anti-apartheid icon’s voice,  saying in the current climate Mandela would have voted for them.

ends intro 

Zwelivilile Mandla Mandela says his grandfather shouldn’t be affiliated with the betrayal of the ANC’s struggle against apartheid.

Mandela’s grandson’s demanding the DA take down an advertisement featuring Madiba’s voice – calling it a gross violation of the electoral code.

He says the ANC is disgusted by what he calls the flagrant abuse of the former president by the DA.

He says throughout his life and until his death, Mandela was a loyal and committed member of the ANC.

Associating him with the DA is an affront  to his history, his choice of party, his legacy and values for which he stood.

If the DA wants to invoke history in its election campaign it should  use the voice of its former and current leaders – adding that this leadership has provided the laager of white privilege since the onset of democracy in 1994.

The DA’s spokesperson Refiloe Ntsekhe says Nelson Mandela belongs to everyone.

The DA is reminding South Africa of what Mandela preached.

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The opposition Democratic Alliance  has warned it’ll fight any attempt at shielding the president from having his day in court.

Last month, the High Court in Pretoria ruled the National Prosecuting Authority was wrong seven years ago to drop criminal charges against President Jacob Zuma.

The ruling was a victory for the official opposition, which asked the court to review the  decision by Abrhamas’ predecessor to withdraw the charges against Zuma.

The High Court found that Mokotedi  Mpshe breached a cardinal legal rule by not continuing with prosecuting with the charges that stem from an arms procurement deal in 1999.

Judge Aubrey Ledwaba found that the decision taken to drop corruption charges against Zuma was irrational.

He further ruled that the matter needed to be reviewed.

The National Prosecuting spokesperson Luvuyo Mfaku says they’ve been studying the decision.

Their head Shaun Abrahams will address the nation with the final decision.

Head of the Democratic Alliance Federal Executive, James Selfe says the judgment was a unanimous decision of a full bench. It’s difficult to conceive that those judges would believe that a different court would come to another conclusion.

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The High Court judge, who is a white woman, says in a Facebook  exchange with a friend that rape is apart of black culture.

Judge Mabel Jansen says  in her message that black men believe a woman is there to pleasure them.

She adds that this is is seen as an absolute right and a woman’s consent is not required.

Jansen holds that she  still has to meet a black girl who was not raped at about 12 years old

Concluding that murder is also is not a big deal, she says   gang rapes of baby, daughter and mother are  a pleasurable pastime.

The Democratic Alliance  has reported the messages

to the country’s Judicial Services Commission to be investigated.

The party says the judge’s  comments are hurtful and demeaning and undermine the dignity of South Africa’s people.

The women’s league of the ruling African National Congress says the judge’s  racist comments misrepresent facts about black culture.

Jansen says her postings, made  confidentially to somebody in a position to help,  have been have been taken completely out of context .

She says the real issue… is the protection of vulnerable women and children.

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The ANC Youth League, which Malema led before being expelled from the party three years ago, has asked the national defense force to set soldier on the EFF after Malema’s threat.

ends intro

ANC spokesman Zizi Kodwa says they’ve made a formal accusation against Julius  Malema at a police station in Johannesburg.

Kodwa alleges Malema’s  utterances and conduct are treasonable.

HE says the ANC’s protecting  and defending  South Africa hard-earned democracy.

For  anyone to say they are prepared to remove a democratically elected government through undemocratic means such as through the barrel of a gun is a serious threat.

Both the  EFF and the largest opposition party, the Democratic Alliance, are trying to wrest control of key cities such as Pretoria, Johannesburg and Port Elizabeth from the ANC in municipal elections scheduled for August 3.

Malema says he’s happy to answer Kodwa’s challenge in court.

He says the EFF’s  running out of patience and is considering using force against the government because of its alleged use of violence against protesters.

He says the ANC’s rigged election in the most populous province of Gauteng before and the EFF won’t allow them to get away with it again.

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He was greeted with loud cheers and enthusiasm by tens of thousands of people in the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium where his the ANC faces a neck-and-neck battle battle in what was once a stronghold.

ends intro

Projecting a resolutely upbeat image, President Jacob Zuma  did a lap around the stadium upon entry to greet the crowd.

There were an estimated 30,000 people present, far short of the 110 000 that party spokesperson Zizi Kodwa promised would attend.

Zuma assured them that a vote for the ANC would be a vote for the constitution.

The the highest court in the  land has declared Zuma flouted the constitution by failing to heed the Public Protector’s directive to pay back public money spend on non-security upgrades to his private home.

ANC spokesperson Zizi Kodwa explained that  the stadium wasn’t filled to capacity was because the 4,000 buses laid on by the party left late from different areas of the Eastern Cape. A member of the ANC provincial executive committee in the Eastern Cape blamed the ANC head office for failing to pay for transport on time.

The Nelson Mandela Bay metro is a focal point for the upcoming local elections.

The ANC has been losing support to the opposition Democratic Alliance in the area where it once buried its leaders because they it was regarded  as home.

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