Centurion, South Africa – Mountain Bike (MTB) Rider Jaco Oosthuizen went for a recovery MTB Ride on Sunday 14 Sept 2014. This is an account of events in his own words:
I went for a recovery MTB Ride after an awesome Crater Cruise on Saturday. About 5kms from my house in the open area in front of Cornwall Hill, two black males attacked me very expectantly. I fell off my bike and they forced me onto the ground.
I did not know whether they were armed or not and did not resist. Told them they can take everything. They tied my hands behind my back and then told me to walk into the bush. I asked why and told them to just take the bike and let me go.
They then blatantly told me that the bike does not mean anything and that today I am going to die. I then moved back to the road and the cable ties broke loose. They started to assault me and hit me with rocks against the one side of my head and back of my head.
Luckily I still had my helmet on.
They were like animals.
I am not sure how long this pursued (probably 5 to 10 minutes) – will spare you the detail.
They then suddenly ran for the bike and left me. Closeby two guys were also cycling and they had a vehicle / kombi with them (George and Schalk). They assisted me to get home and to Emergencies at Unitas.
The staff helped me immediately, went for CAT scan and luckily I had no skull fractures. A lot of stitches later, I went into surgery to clean all the wounds (really awesome deep sleep for an hour) and then went to high care for the night to get my kidneys clean from all the toxins (fight and flight).
Monday AM I was declared fit to go except for swelling in my left hand. This turned out to be a small fracture. I went home Monday PM.
The swelling is now almost back to normal. I have a nice blue eye and yellow skin, but think my mind is back on track. Had some trauma counselling yesterday.
During a time like this you obviously reflect a lot. All I can say for now is that we need to live each day to its fullest and appreciate our family and friends.
I am glad to still be here. Please do not send me stuff about ‘this might be some sort of test for me and I need to learn from it’ – that is total crap. I will obviously learn from this, but it was a chance event.
We should not let things like this infringe on our right to freedom and make us live in fear. I will make use of this opportunity to see how we can make our country a safer place, or rather go.
The freedom and safety of my family is very important – even more after such an event.
South Africa Today – South Africa News
