Man 'happy' about white on bus

2003-04-29 17:11

Pretoria - A 72-year-old black man told the Pretoria High Court on Tuesday he was happy to see a white man get onto a Mamelodi-bound bus in January 2000.

"I told myself, 'Today we have a white passenger'," Matthews Chauke testified in the trial of De Wet Kritzinger.

The white man even stood aside to let in a woman, but then he pointed a firearm at the driver and shot him in the head twice, said Chauke, who sat in the second seat from the front on the left-hand side of the bus.

"After shooting the driver, he turned to my side of the bus and shot the man who sat in front of me. Then he looked in my direction. He wanted to shoot me. A woman who sat on the right-hand side got up, so he shot her and she fell."

Chauke said he also got down and put his head underneath the seat in front of him so he would not be shot.

Promise to God

Kritzinger has pleaded not guilty to three charges of murder and four of attempted murder. He has, however, admitted that he had shot dead the driver and two passengers on a bus in Constantia Park, Pretoria, and wounded four more people.

In a statement read to the court, he claimed that what he did was not wrong, because it was in keeping with a promise he had made to God.

'I am scared'

Leah Stuurman, a complainant in one of the attempted murder charges, said she saw a white boy get onto the bus and move towards the driver.

"I thought he was going to pay, then I heard the shot. He shot the driver, and then he moved towards where I was sitting and shot me in the arm."

She was also wounded in the cheek, where the bullet was still lodged, Stuurman testified.

She could not use her arm anymore and had lost her job as a domestic worker. She had never used a bus since the incident, she said.

"I am scared."

Martha Hala, who sat on the second seat behind the driver, did not even see the gunman.

"I was still sitting there when I realised I was full of blood."

Mirriam Tsoai said the man, who she thought was a passenger, shot the driver, and then started firing shots at people behind him. She hid under a seat, and only realised later she had been hit herself when she found blood on her ear.

Glenda Tlhoboro was waiting for another bus when she saw a white man standing at the bus stop. After all the passengers had got onto the bus, she saw him running towards it and getting in.

'He seemed very aggressive'

"On the last step I saw him put his hand inside his shirt. I thought he would take out some money, then I saw him taking out a firearm."

After shooting some people, the man fell from the bus, got up and followed her as she ran away, Tlhoboro testified.

She ran to the building where she worked and locked herself in a toilet.

Another woman who worked nearby, Petrus Grobbelaar saw a man dressed in jeans at her building's parking area before the incident.

"He seemed very aggressive."

The person was definitely Kritzinger, she said.

"It's been three years, but the man's facial expression has stuck in my mind."

Earlier ballistic expert Superintendent Theunis Britz testified the type of ammunition used during the shooting was of a kind that was intended to expend extra energy on impact, thereby causing more injury.

The trial continues on Wednesday.

- SAPA