A beautiful festival spoilt by predators and poor security

The excitement of seeing the first ever performance of Beyoncé and Jay-Z on South African soil literally catapulted me through the office doors on Sunday. The day had come for the Global Citizen Festival: Mandela 100.

Travelling from Randburg to Soweto was seamless as traffic had died down by then. The Uber driver could not leave us at the drop-off zone at the stadium as it was closed. We took a slow winding walk to the stadium, passing hawkers selling everything from flowers, necklaces, caps, visors among other items. Yay, concert vibes! I thought. After a 15-minute walk we came to a rusty coloured bridge behind which we had to traverse to eventually reach gate E. While on the bridge I noted that there were police vans parked in the Rea Vaya lane below the pedestrian bridge but not a single police officer on the actual bridge. A group of young women walking beside me remarked on the lack of officers on the pedestrian bridge too. It being my first time attending anything at FNB Stadium I had thought it normal and didn’t want to speak out of turn.

One of the girls remarked: “Why are there no cops here, what if someone tries to take your phone?” Another in front of me answered: “I guess we’ll just have to jump off the bridge to get to the cops.” We all laughed to that.

An elderly couple struggling in the heat stopped and asked the police officers around if there was any vehicle available and one of the officers was heard saying, “Ma’am as you can see we’re all suffering under the blazing heat.”

I finally reached the promised land, sort of. In relief I happily traipsed through the barricade only to find a queue longer than I liked to think. A queue marshal informed me that I had to join that long queue to get to gate K, instead. It’s so long and I’m so tired, I grumbled. “Well if you don’t want to get into the line at this point we can talk,” the guy said.

I scoffed at him and went to the back of the line.

After going through more barricades and more ticket checks I finally made it through gate K. Once inside the stadium things became easier.

The atmosphere inside the stadium was electric, screams greeted nearly every speaker that came on stage and host Trevor Noah alongside the likes of Bonang Matheba, Nomzamo Mbatha, Anele Mdoda, Pearl Thusi and Naomi Campbell, seemed to get the loudest screams.

As the concert progressed, it became harder and harder to get the crowd to quiet down to listen to speeches after each musical act. So great was the anticipation of the Beyoncé and Jay-Z act that when Oprah Winfrey said it was a great honour for her to introduce her great friend (meaning Cyril Ramaphosa), the crowd erupted in deafening screams thinking that she was about to introduce Beyoncé. Eventually Beyoncé and Jay-Z took to the stage to the excitement of the audience and gave a rousing performance. However, it would be criminal not to mention Cassper Nyovest’s beautiful act and his budding bromance with Coldplay’s front man Chris Martin which played out on stage. Also, Ed Sheeran is a one-man musical machine!

What marred the experience was on exiting the venue because the barricades were still in place causing huge bottlenecks, with very few stewards or police officers visible. Upon arriving home at 3am in the morning I found out that the concert had provided those who prey on others an opportunity to do just that. The police presence at FNB Stadium was inadequate. I think the SAPS and the JMPD underestimated the magnitude of the event.