My friend Stacey Lee Wilkinson died in a car accident on Friday night. According to the scant information through one friend and the other, the car she was traveling in was hit by a Minibus taxi at the intersection of Barry Hertzog and Empire Roads.
I drove through that intersection on my way back home tonight. It's 2km's from my house. There's a lot of construction going on for the Rea Vaya bus rapid transit system which they're trying to get ready for the 2010 World Cup.
It's a major intersection in Johannesburg, well known by everyone, yet for the last 6 months or so, because of construction, the traffic lights have been out of order.
During daylight hours the intersection is manned by private pointsmen, from a South African insurance company, not by Johannesburg municipal workers, a private insurance company. At night it's deserted and dark. There are no warnings about the lights being out of order.
When I drove through the intersection tonight, coming back from spending a day filming in the poverty of Katlehong, a black township in the East of Joburg, with my colleagues from Tokyo, we saw the flattened pole where the accident occurred, and the broken glass from an accident that killed my friend. My colleagues were shocked that such a thing could have happened, that such a major intersection could be left so unsafe. And they asked me what kind of recourse the family have, because clearly this was unbelievable
I thought about the monthly utility and rates bills I get from the town council, bills that cost about the same as minimum wage here in SA, which most residents in Katlehong would be unable to pay. On the top left corner is the Joburg Logo, and the catchphrase - "Joburg a world class African city."
I thought about the lawlessness of taxi's in this country, I thought about how close to my house Stacey had been when she was killed, and how we'd missed each other in London and not hooked up since she came back to SA, hadn't seen each other for about 6 years, yet here 2 k's from my house, she'd died a death that in a world class city, under the same cirumstances, would really never have been.
And I felt bitter and sad and caustic about this, I still do. Every five minutes I see Stacey in my mind. Throughout the nineties and early 2000's in my circle of friends, she was always there. I guess I'm just coming to terms with everything, and I know I'm bitter, but one thing's for sure, Johannesburg, by world class, is just another African City.
And it makes me sad, because this is the country I love, the continent I treasure and the city I come home to. But it's a sad and unforgiving place.
What's done is done, and bitching won't bring her back, but I feel so horribly numb.
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