NELSPRUIT – Many onlookers were left baffled when they witnessed an old man hanging onto a moving Toyota Tazz during peak time traffic in the city at about 18:00 on Tuesday. Lowvelder managed to track down the man who was seen hanging onto the vehicle. Mr Johan Craus (67) said he was driving from the direction of Kaapsehoop towards Nelspruit when a white Toyota Tazz came up behind him. “He was trying to pass me on a solid line and there was an oncoming ambulance as I got to the robots near Belladonna garage. I braked and stopped my car and got out my vehicle to tell him he could have caused an accident.”
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Craus said on further reflection, the driver could have gotten frightened when he approached him in his vehicle. “I tried to talk to him, but he was winding his window up so I tried to pull the window down when the back passenger grabbed my hand and pulled my arm into their car.” He said that was when they sped off with him hanging onto their car. “They were travelling at a high speed until they got to Chestnut on the corner. They tried to get me into a property but they couldn’t and then others came to help and they let me go.”
Bossies Community Justice Mr Fanus Terblanche said the Tazz was stopped and the men arrested at that time as members of the public had phoned thinking it was a hijacking incident. “We can confirm the vehicle was not stolen and belonged to the driver.” Nelspruit police detective Sgt Michael Horn said the driver told him that Crous and his friend had gotten out the vehicle and had banged on their window. “He says he apparently tried to hit the driver, then the latter saw his friend who got out also coming towards the vehicle and panicked and drove off with the man hanging onto his car.”
A witness who saw and followed the vehicle from the beginning of Enos Mabuza Drive, spoke to Lowvelder. “Im sure the guy’s arm was being held by the passenger as I was following close behind and I could see he was holding onto something. I also couldn’t understand how an old man could hang on for that long without someone trapping him”. He said he saw Crous being released, not at an entrance in a property but on the side of the road and then the vehicle sped away.
The witness then followed the car where he saw them pick up another man on the R40 and, when they were in the Nedbank building in the CBD, he phoned the police to find them there. “I heard them tell the police that they were scared as the man had sworn at them and tried to assault them.” Horn confirmed that neither party had opened a case as yet.
