Covid-19-positive Gauteng man arrested in Limpopo charged with attempted murder

Soon after the results came back positive, the man apparently opted to join the many thousands people who left Gauteng to go home to Limpopo to spend the 21 days of lockdown with their families – against the general advice of government, and in his case against the law.

The man was arrested after he had interacted with other people from the province who probably did not already have the virus.

It is now possible to be charged with attempted murder for knowingly spreading the virus to others, and this has already happened in other cases in South Africa. The man was subsequently also charged with attempted murder.

Limpopo health MEC Phophi Ramathuba last week made headlines for her appeal to all people working in Gauteng to stay there during the Easter holidays. Ramathuba said it was too risky for people working in Gauteng to leave the province to meet with their relatives during the Easter weekend.

“We know they love their families but they can prove they love them and care for them even more if they stayed in their province and avoid risking their lives because Gauteng tops all the provinces in the country with people who tested positive for Covid-19. We therefore appeal to all those in Gauteng to be locked down in the province and not come back to Limpopo until we are able to arrest the disease,” she said.

The department said after the man tested positive, a tracer team in Gauteng struggled to locate him until he was found in Limpopo, where health officials acted swiftly to have him arrested and taken into isolation.

Ramathuba said: “My department will not hesitate to take in anyone who breaks the rules. Being an under-resourced province, the only way we can win this battle is to ensure that those who must be screened and tested do so, and those who must self- quarantine and isolate also do so. Those who fail to observe these basics and expose our communities to danger will be taken in.

The MEC said she was worried her department might have its hands full dealing with potential imported cases such as these, of people who deliberately ignored the call to observe the lockdown.

“The inter-movements of people between provinces will obviously bear consequences as we have said. We just have to be prepared to fight hard because for now there is nothing we can do about it, it is what it is. But we believe with the resources we have in place, we are likely to make more arrests of individuals who fail to self-quarantine and isolate.”

For the better part of the week, Limpopo Premier Stan Mathabatha and Ramathuba have been at the Mantshole Traffic Control centre, screening people as they pass through the toll gate while educating them about the deadly virus.

The duo has also gone to the Beitbridge Border Post near Musina where throngs of people pass through the gate from South Africa to Zimbabwe and other SADC countries.

The gate was closed since Thursday at midnight and opened on Friday to allow some flow of traffic.

For more news your way, download The Citizen’s app for iOS and Android.