Hijacked UJ student afraid to return

AKWAZULU-Natal teenager kidnapped in a hijacking in Johannesburg at the weekend says she is now too scared to go back.

Kwanele Mazibuko, 18, yesterday spoke to The Mercury from her home in Nquthu.

The BCom finance student at the University of Johannesburg said she was standing with a friend outside her Auckland Park commune on Saturday night when a car pulled up behind them.

“Three guys jumped out of their car with guns pointed at us. They shouted at us to get into (our) car, it all happened so fast,” said Mazibuko.

They then bundled the couple into the back seat of the VW Golf 5, and when they realised there was a third person, who was in the driver’s seat, they also forced him in the back.

“One of the guys (perpetrators) jumped in the back with us, so I had to sit on my friend’s lap. The other two jumped in the front and drove off,” she said. They demanded wallets and cellphones.

Mazibuko was still in her pyjamas and thought the worst as they drove off.

“They told us they would drop us off as soon as they got out of Auckland Park. They were very calm but I was scared. I thought of all those stories I had seen on the news and imagined what my twin sister Sanele and mother would go through if anything happened to me,” she said.

Her mother, Simphiwe Buthelezi, drove to Johannesburg as soon as she was informed by her daughter’s roommates of what had happened. They had been informed by the security guard of a neighbouring building.

“I was thinking the worst but praying for the best. I didn’t know what I was going to do when I got to Johannesburg, but I could not sit at home when my baby was somewhere out there in the hands of armed men,” said Buthelezi.

After driving around for hours, the men dropped the trio on a highway with maize fields on either side, said Mazibuko.

Scared

“They told us to walk into the maize field but also pointed us in the direction of the police station. They then made a U-turn and left us there.

“We were scared that they would discover there was a tracker on the car and come back to kill us, so we walked in the maize field. But it was hours before we came to a residential area, where we asked to be directed to a police station,” she said. They were in Katlehong on the East Rand.

When she was finally reunited with her mother on Monday, Mazibuko broke down. “I just wanted to go home. I needed to be with my family and feel safe,” she said.

She said she had been mugged three times before, on her way to or from campus, around Auckland Park.

“I went to Johannesburg because I was told UJ has the best commerce department. I don’t regret my decision but I am so scared now,” she said. Her mother was also worried.

“Who knows what will happen next? I’m paying for her accommodation but she is on a bursary. I don’t know if I can get her transferred to Durban at least. I’m dreading having to take her back (to UJ),” she said.

Brixton police are investigating the incident.