While 2020 will forever be known as the Year of Covid (perhaps we will even start referring to years as BC and AC, After Covid and Before Covid), in the greater Dundee area there was, of course, more happening than just masks and hand sanitizing.

While the year and all its extremes may have brought people together, despite social distancing, it was a year in which shocking murders and tragedies ripped the community a part.

The year started with the usual good news from the Matric Class of 2019 followed by the still outstanding controversy of the R50-million-something Disaster Management Centre adjacent to the airfield which remains half built and vandalized.

Then came the Coin-It liquidation judgement which investors thought would bring relief. This was later followed by a Judgement ruling in favour of Coin-It and then the surprising raid some weeks ago where the Hawks seized properties and vehicles and aircraft linked to the assets of Coin-It director/s.

Our favourite Municipality, Endumeni, is never far out of the news, tending to put their foot in it when they have the moral upper hand. A failure to earn Brownie points by passing a Covid-relief budget put them on the back foot followed by a bid to make the Exco Councillors full time … and then came the report that two Councillors and around 22 municipal officials are adding to the chronic electricity theft in the Municipal area. Tut, tut.

There was also much tragedy. Some out of our hands, such as the tragic and shocking passing of much loved George Adalis. Never before has the Courier received so many heart felt tributes from virtually all over the world, remembering a man who certainly made a difference in his community.

And then there were the two murders in three days – the burnt body of community health worker, Sibongile Majola, was found near Colley Street. Three days later, Ronnie Calitz, was stabbed in his Beaconsfield Street house which was then set on fire. ‘Jimmy’ Mulhatton has been charged for the murder of Ronnie but to date, no one has been charged for Sibongile’s murder.

Hattingspruit, once the setting for jolly German beer, yachting and fun, was in the headlines for the wrong reasons in July. Throwing social distancing aside, protesters blocked off access to the town after demanding that only locals be given jobs at a nearby coal mine.

All the terrible crime prompted local bikers to join in the countrywide protest action against the scourge. There was also the house fire tragedy on Tatham Street which claimed the life of an eleven-month-old baby. Again, a tragedy that could have been prevented.

The rural areas around Dundee also had their share of tragic murders with a traditional leader and relative being gunned down in an assassination style killing near Nquthu while in Msinga a principal was shot dead at his school, following an apparent wrangle over a promotion.

There was also the shock finding of two men who had been murdered and their bodies dumped in a vacant plot adjacent to Dundee Primary School in September

But perhaps, amid all the horrors of 2020, was the cruel attack and murder of an elderly wheelchair-bound woman in her Peacevale home.

Surely 2021 will help us re-discover our humanity?