Tag: Benoni

Eight miners shot execution style

Eight bodies of miners killed execution style were found over the weekend, two of them underground.

Lt-Col Lungelo Dlamini could not say whether more bodies were thought to still be underground.

According to a report in The Star murders took place at the Modder East mine, between the N12 and New Modder Road.

All eight were shot in the upper body. The motive for the killing was unknown and the bodies had not been identified.

On Monday, Dlamini said there were allegations that the men were foreigners.

On Saturday morning security guards found several cartridges near the bodies.

No arrests had been made.

The bodies were discovered by mine security between Saturday and Sunday.

“We don’t know the motive behind the killings,” said Dlamini.

Local media is speculating that they could have been killed by a rival illegal mining gang.

Fighting between competing gangs is commonplace among the illegal miners at South Africa’s abandoned gold mines, where unemployed and impoverished people extract any remaining gold with makeshift tools.

Much of the area around Johannesburg is pockmarked with old shafts,and while many are no longer commercially viable, they still contain enough deposits to attract scores of unemployed.

Four Nigerians die in gang-style shooting in Benoni

gunlawsFour Nigerians died when a group of men opened fire on them in Benoni, on the East Rand, police said on Friday.

Five men were in a Volkswagen Golf on Thursday evening when a car stopped in front of them, Constable Tim Masilela said.

A group of men got out of the car and opened fire, killing two men in the Golf.

A wounded passenger tried to run away, but collapsed and died a few metres from the scene. A fourth man died later in hospital. The fifth man in the car was not hurt.

“The motive behind the shooting is unknown. Police are still investigating,” Masilela said.

Last Saturday, three Nigerians were killed in a cellphone shop in Voortrekker Street, Benoni. They were inside the shop when five armed men entered around 6pm, Lt-Col Lungelo Dlamini said at the time.

The five opened fire, killing two of the customers, both 38, inside the shop, and the third man, 40, at the shop door.

The gunmen fled in a green BMW. They were also believed to be Nigerians, said Dlamini. He said the police found spent cartridges at the scene, and a licensed firearm belonging to one of the men who died. Nothing was stolen.

“The motive for the killing is still unknown but a possibility that the victims were a rival group is being investigated,” he said. – Sapa

March turns violent as thousands protest service delivery

Over 7 000 protesters, carrying sticks and knobkerries, arrived at the Benoni Customer Care Centre, at the corner of Elston Avenue and Tom Jones Street, in separate groups on October 17, to hand over a memorandum.

The town was brought to a standstill for two hours, from 8am, and almost all the shops were closed for safety reasons.

The protesters, some as young as 10, vandalised a number of shops, stoned passing motorists, stole goods belonging to hawkers and upturned rubbish bins.

The door of the Department of Education was also broken in the process. No one has been arrested, despite all of this.

The situation calmed as both the SAPS and Metro Police started to arrive in numbers. A police helicopter was also hovering in the sky, to try to keep order.

The protesters were residents of the Actonville hostel and the informal settlements in Actonville and Wattville.

Residents said they wanted houses.

“We have been living in shacks for many years and we are tired of this,” said a woman who wanted to remain anonymous.

An Actonville Hostel resident said they have sewage running all over the hostel and that they were promised proper housing, but that nothing has naterialised.

After handing over their memorandum, the protesters tried to break down the Customer Care Centre fence, in order gain access to the premises, but police used stun grenades to disperse the crowed.

The protesters were then escorted out of town by a police officers. Benoni resident Stephen Frances (19) was beaten with sticks and robbed of his money and cellphone by unruly protesters.

He was walking along Elston Avenue when a mob of protesters pounced on him for no particular reason.

“I did nothing to these people, but they decided to beat me up and take my money and cellphone,” said Frances, who emerged from the crowd running for his life.

He showed the City Times the marks sticks left on his body. –  The Citizen