4th robbery: man wants to leave SA
Being the victim of a robbery for the fourth time in two years has now forced a businessman to seriously consider selling his businesses and leaving the country.
POLOKWANE – Being the victim of a robbery for the fourth time in two years has now forced a businessman to seriously consider selling his businesses and leaving the country.
Fharos Patel, a Mogwadi resident and frequent visitor to Polokwane, said in the latest robbery of which he was a victim, he was doing his monthly shopping for stock at a shopping centre in Ladanna.
“I had just finished doing my shopping and was on the way home. At the intersection of the Louis Trichardt road and Vermikuliet Street where I had stopped for a red traffic light, two armed men jumped into my bakkie,” Patel said. He said the armed men instructed him to drive along the Loius Trichardt road and turn off at the Soetdorings turn-off where he was forced to drive into the veld.
Another bakkie in which three accomplices of the armed robbers were travelling, met the two armed robbers there.
The robbers loaded everything they could into their vehicle along with an undisclosed amount of money.
They also took his vehicle keys, business keys and home keys as well as three cell phones that Patel used for business.
Patel was assaulted and hit on the head before the men left him on the side of the road.
A woman who lives near the Soetdorings turn-off was stopped by Patel.
“I was making my way to the stop sign at the Soetdorings turn-off when the man banged against my window. He told me that he had just been robbed and that he needed medical assistance. I called the community policing forum, police and medical assistance immediately,” the woman, who did not wish to be identified, told Review.
Westenburg police spokesperson, Capt Mohlaka Mashiane, confirmed that a case of armed robbery was being investigated by the police and he urged people with information to contact the Westenburg police station.
Mashiane urged residents who do trips to buy stock and have to deal with a lot of money at a time to make use of internet transactions or card payments and to travel in groups as far as possible to avoid being made an easy target when travelling alone.
Patel said this had been the fourth robbery in two years.
“I am seriously considering leaving South Africa for good,” he said.
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