With the festive season upon us, the fact of the matter is that preventable incidents are happening right before our eyes.
When accidents occur and families lose their loved ones, blame is placed upon the drivers, whereas road officials and people in authority could have prevented such tragedies.
I am pleading with those in authority to organise their planning properly and help us prevent these accidents. There is no need for people to lose their lives when we can see these dangerous situations developing right before our very eyes.
Community By-Laws Ignored
We, the people living close to the roads, are witnessing this daily and ask ourselves: what has happened to our community by-laws?
To think that these people herding cattle are foreign nationals carrying out these activities in our beloved country is concerning. Some of them are hired by our very own South African nationals.
The road traffic agency has done its best to erect fences in places, but to no avail—these people are damaging the barriers and allowing cattle to pass freely on our roads. These fences are there to protect our licenced drivers, only for these individuals to put lives in danger.
Urgent Action Required
We need to stand together and fight illegal cattle herding in our communities and near our roads. Our people are dying at this time of year due to negligence by people in authority.
The SPCA is also seemingly doing nothing or making any effort to help the greater public in this regard. They are not warning these people properly or attempting to remove them from these premises. It appears they are in cahoots with these individuals—which is dangerously damning, allowing this illegal cattle herding to continue.
Municipal Responsibility
This is all happening in Welkom, which falls under Matjhabeng Local Municipality and the greater Lejweleputswa District. What a shame—we have had enough of these animals causing fatalities amongst our licenced drivers. Our drivers are blamed for every road death.
Enough is enough.
I urge immediate action from all relevant authorities to address this pressing safety concern before more lives are lost.
