Mooi River man killed at Royal Show

A young man travelled from Mooi River to Pietermaritzburg on Sunday, June 7 for the annual Ukhozi FM concert, traditionally held on the last Sunday of the 10-day Royal Show. The Royal Show is the largest mixed agricultural show known to KwaZulu-Natal.

The Public Eye reported that he was stabbed to death amongst turmoil, which broke out when thousands of attendees discovered that organisers had allegedly cancelled the concert. The crowd was moved to the Invesco Centre, some distance from the Royal Showgrounds, as an alternative party zone.

Soon after the move chaos and violence unfolded when drunken attendees turned on each other. The young man who has been identified as ‘Themba’ from Mooi River was apparently attacked and stabbed repeatedly. The police who first arrived on scene were met by the flustered crowd and had to take control with firearms drawn to prevent any further violence from breaking out.

Soon thereafter other SAPS members arrived and blocked the area off. A suspect was arrested and police also recovered other weapons in the vicinity. Responding to matter, CEO of the Royal Agricultural Society, Mr TD Strachan who said that in fact the Ukhozi FM concert wasn’t a part of the programme at all.

“By way of refreshing the mix of entertainment, and in deference to our Zulu speaking guests, the event was replaced with the Vuma FM Gospel concert on Sunday, May 31.

Further, to avoid any misunderstanding, my office placed A4 size adverts in in the mainline media, circulating in the Pietermaritzburg and greater Durban areas informing the public that the Ukhozi FM concert would not be part of the 2015 Royal Show; this to complement frequent updates on our website and Facebook page.

I understand that the Ukhozi FM concert is scheduled to take place at the Pietermaritzburg Oval on Saturday, June 13 and that this has been alluded to by way of the station’s on-air advertising,” commented Mr Strachan.