Man found dead after being kicked out of taxi

The unfathomable death of a 27-year-old man has flung his family into profound mourning and distress because of the circumstances around his passing away.

Motorists discovered Thomas Manenzhe sprawling inert on the grass by the side of the freeway between the Tobias and Haakdooring roads in the Naboomspruit policing area on 29 June at about 09:00. He had bruises on the body, his left knee was swollen, and his one leg was broken. His belt was found in another spot, while his shoes were also off his feet, several metres away.

Thomas was a resident at Magau village in the Sinthumule area.

The provincial police’s spokesperson, Col Moatshe Ngoepe, said that the police were investigating a case of culpable homicide. “We request members of the public to assist in providing us with information that might lead to the identification and arrest of the suspect,” Ngoepe said.

However, according to the information provided by the family and one female passenger who could not be named at this stage, Manenzhe boarded a minibus taxi en route from Gauteng to Venda from the Bosman Station taxi rank in Pretoria. The taxi broke down along the way, just around the Kranskop tollgate.

“We waited for some time while the driver arranged for another taxi to come and load us, because he could neither fix the vehicle nor determine the cause of the problem,” said a fellow passenger. “A similar taxi arrived, and we all got into it. We drove off for some time before an older man and two young men were involved in a fracas with Thomas.”

The three men allegedly started beating Thomas right inside the moving taxi. He fell down in the passage and they allegedly continued kicking him. The taxi eventually stopped, and the four men were advised to get off to continue “fighting” outside the taxi.

However, the driver insisted that Thomas should be left there at that place, because he was now talking too much.

The family spokesperson, Naledzani Mulaudzi, said that the family was utterly distraught about the manner in which the taxi driver had treated their son.

“Had the driver not left him along the way, our child would not have died,” she said. “It’s not clear at this stage whether he was injured by the three men or whether some criminals found him alone in the night and killed him. But as a family we put blame on the driver and the taxi association to which he is affiliated – taxi associations should school their drivers in how to treat passengers and deal with any misunderstanding which might occur among passengers. Any driver in their right mind couldn't kick out a passenger in the wilderness!”

Mulaudzi said that the family needed answers from the taxi association and that they believed that the police would leave no stone unturned in probing this matter.

However, the actual taxi that ferried the passengers from the Bosman Station taxi rank is not known at this stage, but the police were provided with the registration number of the second taxi minibus that accepted passengers at Kranskop tollgate.

Thomas Manenzhe was working at Delmas in Mpumalanga. He is survived by his mother, Mavis Manenzhe, and his wife, Dorah Mabasa. He was laid to rest on Saturday (6 July).

News - Date: 13 July 2019

Tshifhiwa Mukwevho

Tshifhiwa Given Mukwevho was born in 1984 in Madombidzha village, not far from Louis Trichardt in the Limpopo Province. After submitting articles for roughly a year for Limpopo Mirror's youth supplement, Makoya, he started writing for the main newspaper. He is a prolific writer who published his first book, titled A Traumatic Revenge in 2011. It focusses on life on the street and how to survive amidst poverty. His second book titled The Violent Gestures of Life was published in 2014.

Email: [email protected]