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Cops have been thrown a curve ball

I’ve been waking up with tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat following the recent conviction by a Pretoria High Court Judge of the eight Daveyton policemen accused of the death of Mozambican taxi driver Mido Masia in 2013.

For the past fortnight, I’ve been waking up with tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat following the recent conviction by a Pretoria High Court Judge of the eight Daveyton policemen accused of the death of Mozambican taxi driver Mido Masia in 2013.

Of course, my thoughts and views as well as the merits of the case as presented in court by witnesses, together with the findings of the judge as to what happened at that particular busy taxi rank in Daveyton, is by now, neither here nor there as the matter is already water under the bridge.

I have to, however, argue that my views and sympathies pertaining to this case tends to differ because of what I’ve gathered from the local bush-telegraph and my life experience as a township- born-and raised street-wise South African male.

It goes without saying that Masia was not a South African and thus unwise and uncouth in his knowledge of the unwritten rules of township etiquette when dealing with the men and women in blue. In my opinion he committed a cardinal sin and paid with his life.

Yes, of course the cops may have erred and none of us reading this column know exactly what really happened inside the cell after the Mozambican was finally restrained and detained at the local police station.

But, to me and many others who think as I do, it is the volatile situation and eruptive reaction of the group of unruly Mozambican traders at the taxi rank that agitated the cops as they tried to arrest Masia for a minor traffic violation.

It was in fact the Mozambican taxi driver’s violent resistance to arrest which later turned the whole situation into what has since become presented in court as police brutality and essentially tilted the scales against the eight Daveyton policemen.

But, in my mind, the very crowd of traders who cheered and joined in the fracas by throwing objects at the cops, before the arrest took center-stage, should have been in the dock alongside the convicted eight cops.

Instead of pelting the cops with objects and thus attempting to assist or encourage a suspect to flee from lawful custody, the traders should have acted like any self-respecting law abiding citizens and joined the cops in arresting the taxi driver for breaking the law and resisting arrest.

Of course, had this been the case, Masia would have been transported to the same police station where he later died but perhaps he would have only been charged and kept overnight.

Better still, knowing the ways of life in our townships, had the Mozambican simply greased the palm of any of the arresting cops on the scene, the whole incident would have evaporated into thin air and life would have carried on as before.

Now the over zealous police officers who were on duty trying to rid the streets of Daveyton of law-breakers like Masia on that fateful day, are themselves facing the bleak prospect of spending the rest of their condemned lives behind bars.

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