City woman hijacked and held hostage

AN Empangeni woman escaped with her life after being robbed, kidnapped and held up for an entire night in bushes near Grantham Park.

The victim reported to the police last Wednesday that she had parked her vehicle while chatting to a friend at around 6.30pm.

Three men, one of whom was known to her, approached them with firearms and ordered them into the car. They demanded the woman’s and her friend’s cellphone as well as her bank card.

One of the men left to withdraw cash while the two others remained with the victims in the car, which they parked off in bushes for the entire night.

The man who took her card never returned but she later found out that R13 000 had been withdrawn from her account.

The victims were then left near the bushes where they had been held hostage, while the two criminals fled with her car the next morning.

Crime spike

The incident was recorded at a time when authorities have reported a drastic crime spike in Empangeni.

Business robberies have been rife at Empangeni Rail, with three having taken place in the last week.

Empangeni Community Policing Forum spokesperson Zonita Grobbelaar, said that after a fairly quiet holiday season, residents are urged to be vigilant.

‘There has been an increase in business robberies but residential burglaries are also starting to pick up.

‘We had a quiet period when between the end of last year and the beginning of this year, there were hardly any burglaries, but it would seem that has come to an end.’

Last week, a Gxigxi Reserve woman was left traumatised after waking up to criminals trying to break into her home.

According to her statement, everything in her house was in order when she went to bed but she woke to the sound of her window being smashed during the night.

She saw a group of people in her yard and, out of fear, fled from her home with her children through the main entrance of the house.

When she returned about half an hour later, she found that her cellphone and her child’s school bag and stationery had been stolen.