14 September 2017
A Commuter was stabbed yesterday morning in the left side of his buttocks after he jumped through an open window to get onto train 9510 at the Philippi Station on the notorious Central Line in the Western Cape.
Donna Venter, a trade union representative of the United National Transport Union (UNTU) working for the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) in Salt River, witnessed how the commuter’s bag hit another commuter on the head when he came through the window.
“The other commuter was furious. There was no space to move on the train due to the overcrowding. The man got so angry that he stabbed the commuter in the left buttocks and through him out of the window again,” Venter told Steve Harris, General Secretary of UNTU.
The injured commuter managed to hang on to the open window with his hands and held on until the train came to a halt at the Nyanga Station where another commuter helped him to climb through the open window.
According to Harris the overcrowding of the Prasa trains on the Central and Northern lines are creating life-threatening situations for commuters and the train crew, the majority of which are members of UNTU.
“The overcrowding of the trains now is a direct result of the vandalism of train coaches by furious commuters who started torching coaches when trains were delayed due to cable theft or other infrastructure related problems,” Harris said.
This comes after Lindikhaya Zide, Acting Group Chief Executive Council, elaborated on the crisis Prasa is facing in his turn-around strategy he presented to Labour at the Prasa Forum in July.
According to the strategy 2 081 (46%) of the train coaches of Prasa’s fleet across the country is out of service. Of these coaches 375 were vandalised.
The result is that there is a train set shortage daily with only 248 sets per day available against the required 287 sets. This is the reason why 10% of trains is cancelled at peak times and trains are on average delayed by up to 30 minutes.
According to Harris the shortage of train coaches resulted in a decision by Richard Walker, Regional Manager of Prasa in the Western Cape, to reduce the amount of coaches used on these routes from 14 to 9 per train, but to maintain running 60 train sets per day.
Harris said Walker should rather have reduced the number of trains but increased the amount of coaches on the train, in peak times.
Venter says she is currently late for work daily because she is unable to get onto a train. She gets home at night after 21:00 due to the shortage of trains.
Just last month Zide confirmed in his feedback about the implementation of the turn-around strategy that the levels of crime on the railway lines in the Western Cape remained high and stated that Prasa was engaging the South African Police Services (SAPS) in its search for solutions.
UNTU applied to the Western Cape High Court to join the SAPS in its application against Prasa. UNTU is asking the Court to force Prasa and the SAPS to drastically improve the safety of the Unions members working on the Central Line. A date for the hearing of the application has not yet been set.
For more information phone Harris on 082 566 5516.
Issued on behalf of UNTU by Sonja Carstens, Media and Liaison Officer. For UNTU Press Statements phone 082 463 6806 or e-mail sonja@untu.co.za.
