Earlier this month, a promising young dancer, Shaun Buso, was out with some friends when they were approached by nine men who beat them and stabbed Shaun to death.
The cause of the incident is not known.
Buso was 18 years old and a dance student at Learning Alive, where he was a member of the hip-hop group. He did well in the various competitions and shows and placed in the Gauteng Dance Championships.
He was an ambitious and hardworking young man who had been on a fundraising drive so he could compete at the SA Championships. He also put a lot of time, energy and effort into creating a platform for township dancers.
Many in the township said Buso was a leader, a source of empowerment, a game-changer and a positive person.
Diepsloot needed Buso. He didn’t deserve to die, they said.
To honour this young man and to keep his township dance legacy alive, Buso’s mentor, Corlanie Botha, the director of Midrand’s Power In Dance South Africa and a World Hip Hop champion, is intending to establish a Shaun Buso Dance Academy and will be kick-starting the initiative with the launching of the Fight the Knife campaign as part of the plan to fight back in Buso’s name.
Too many young people lives’ have been cut short because of the practice of carrying knives and using them to solve disputes.
The key pillars of Fight the Knife campaign are:
- Safe conflict resolutions
- Safe fun
- Safe response
- Safe communities
To create awareness of the Fight the Knife campaign, Learning Alive, Power in Dance, friends and family will host a march on 14 October at 10am, starting at the Diepsloot Combined School and walking through Diepsloot to the police station to hand in a memorandum indicating that, ‘Too many lives cut short – stop fighting with knives … FIGHT THE KNIFE’.
Details: info@powerindance.co.za or fighttheknives@gmail.com
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