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news
Cape Town road rage YouTube stillVideo: South Africa cycling organisations condemn cyclists' road rage attack on van driver
Cycling South Africa says it is “horrified and disgusted” at a video posted to YouTube that shows members of a group of cyclists allegedly assaulting a van driver in Cape Town, including one using pepper spray on him. Other cycling organisations have also condemned the behaviour of the cyclists involved.
The incident took place on Sunday 2 March on Sea Point road in Cape Town, reports IOL News. The driver of the van was a 19-year-old student who had been volunteered to help clean up the road after the 10km Nelson Mandela Commemorative Walk.
It came at the start of the biggest week of the year for cycling in the Western Cape, with a series of events building up to Sunday’s Cape Argus Cycle Tour, with around 30,000 entrants the world’s biggest mass participation cycling event.
Footage of the incident captured by Symon Scott, who posted it to YouTube. A friend of his also provided it to the police. Mr Scott said: “There was a lot more going down than what you can see in the video."
According to the description of the video provided by Mr Scott, the van “was double parked but it went unnoticed by the leader of the group who was looking back and communicating to the rest of the team.
“The group were moving swiftly and only at the last second when the leader again faced forwards, did he see the vehicle... Just in the nick of time.
“He had to swerve violently to avoid the vehicle and this obviously upset him. He stopped his bicycle abruptly and flew into a violent rage. The entire peloton pulled up in support and some followed his lead.”
In his account of the incident, the driver, Ibrahim Waggie, said: “I was driving down Sea Point Beach Road. There were these water sachets and the guys at the back of the van were spraying each other.
“There were about 30 cyclists taking up one whole lane, and I overtook them. I don’t know if they got wet from the water sachets they were playing with in the back, or if one of the sachets hit them.
“I stopped at a red robot, where the guys would pick up sachets, when this man just started hitting me. I didn’t know for what reason.
“One guy hit me with the wheel of his bicycle twice. One hit me with fists. I was sprayed three times with pepper spray. It was for 15-20 minutes and I couldn’t drive away because I couldn’t see,” he added.
A police spokesman has confirmed that "cases of common assault and malicious damage to property were opened at Sea Point police station on Sunday.”
In a statement, Cycling South Africa said it “is horrified and disgusted by the behaviour and actions of a group of cyclists towards a motorist in the Western Cape at the weekend, that has emerged in a video clip online.
“Cycling SA condemns this type of behaviour in the strongest way possible and in no way condones or accepts this type of behaviour. This reaction towards a motorist cannot be justified in any manner whatsoever, whatever the circumstances. There is just no place for such behaviour in our sport.
It added: “Cycling SA is in touch with the cycling clubs who have been represented in the footage, and are currently trying to identify these individuals to institute immediate action, if they are affiliated to the organisation.”
The Pedal Power Association (PPA), South Africa’s largest recreational cycling organisation which stages some 50 events each year, said: “We are investigating the incident as a matter of urgency.
“We have contacted the club in question and have asked them for an official response as well as the names of the cyclists in question, to reach PPA on Tuesday 4 March 2014. Once we have all the facts at our disposal, disciplinary action will take place.”
The Cape Town Cycling Trust said that it condemned “in the strongest possible terms the incident that occurred in the early hours of Sunday morning. The kind of behaviour displayed is totally unacceptable.
“The Trust will be working together with the Pedal Power Association to identify those involved, following which the names will be forwarded to the authorities for a formal investigation, the outcome of which will determine the consequences for those involved.”
There were calls on the PPA’s Facebook page for the riders involved, and even their clubs, to be excluded from the Cape Argus Cycle Tour.
Some of the cyclists (in the light blue, yellow and white kit) were identified as belonging to the Muhammadeyah Cycling Club, although none of them is shown actually participating in the attack in the video.
The club posted a message on its Facebook page that read: “We are currently liaising with the relevant parties and investigating the matter,” adding it would provide an update “as soon as possible.” That page now appears to have been made private.
An article from the PPA republished on the club’s website in October warned cyclists to be vigilant following a series of muggings of lone riders.
That perhaps explains why one rider may have armed himself with pepper spray, which is legal in South Africa – although that is of course no excuse for the alleged use of it by a rider in Sunday's incident.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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46 comments
Weak.
The outcome:
http://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/cyclists-settle-assault-case-out-...
I don't understand - why are the South African cyclists organisations being asked to comment on / justify the actions of these cyclists?
Isn't that like the AA or the RAC being asked to explain and justify the actions of some road-raging motorist (or lorry driver who's squashed someone)? And that never happens...
They were in club colours and are answerable to the club. The club, in turn, is answerable to the regional/national cycling authorities.
It almost seems a bit silly to report this sort of thing as we are never going to have the full story.
The idea that a group of cyclists would attack a driver because they were double-parked seems a little hard to believe. Maybe it's true but it seems unlikely to me.
'I don’t know if they got wet from the water sachets they were playing with in the back, or if one of the sachets hit them'
This seems to suggest that water was being sprayed out of the vehicle and that 'sachets' were being similarally ejected. Is this normal behaviour in SA?
I'd never condone the sort of behaviour shown in the vid but its not too much of a leap of imagination to consider the possibility that the cyclists had had things thrown at them from the vehicle. This wouldn't excuse their behaviour but it would offer a more credible explanation than the notion that the driver was attacked for double-parking.
Sea Point road rage: Cyclists arrested
http://ewn.co.za/2014/03/05/Road-rage-cyclists-2-apprehended?utm_source=...
Having ridden in SA, pepperspray, knives and guns are common items to carry - and never in your backpack. You can't get to them quickly enough. There were several routes we would only ride if armed and in a group. The rate of violence and stress in everyday SA is VERY high - these incidents often blow up. Two weeks ago a motorcyclist was shot dead by a motorist in a similar incident.
Two cyclists have now been arrested and will appear in court today. A third is being sought.
Well... nobody died, so that's nice. ＼(^▽^＠)ノ
There's quite a few such degenerates around who appear in a Cyclist's form.
Whilst not a direct comment on the story above i think it is worth pointing out that South Africa, whilst looking very nice superficially, is a proper bad ass country where life is very cheap and you can be killed in a heartbeat if someone wants to steal your car (or an expensive looking bike) so different rules of self defence apply in that country for this reason - hence the pepper spray.
I think it should also be mentioned that the issue of race is a very open sore still to this day and i cant help noticing the colour of the skin of the cyclists. Once again - different rules apply. We dont know what was said, implied or otherwise before from the van's occupants that caused the cyclist to react like this.
Assault is Assault. Cannot be justified!
A glimpse of what's to come over here? I've said before that we should be careful what we wish for. The politicization of cycling is not necessarily a good thing - politics tends to divide rather than unite, and I'm afraid I see the division between 'motorist' and 'cyclist' growing. Cyclists with a strong voice will not be tolerated. The BBC are already starting their propaganda campaign!
A glimpse of what's to come over here? I've said before that we should be careful what we wish for. The politicization of cycling is not necessarily a good thing - politics tends to divide rather than unite, and I'm afraid I see the division between 'motorist' and 'cyclist' growing. Cyclists with a strong voice will not be tolerated. The BBC are already starting their propaganda campaign!
NOTHING justifies the assault of another human being!
This is outright thuggery and I would charge the cyclists who stood by with being accessories before, during and after the fact.
Can you imagine the comments if the young driver had panicked and driven over the cyclists to escape?
I saw the vehicle with the side flame throwers, my god how insane can someone be to want to use one ?????
It seems a trifle absurd, I think, to try and find _any_ wider wider significance in an event like this, a minor altercation between people none of us know, occurring in a country with a shocking level of violent crime, itself probably partly a consequence of a very particular history.
People get into disputes with each other. It happens a million times a day all over the world. (In that particular country the disputes often end very badly indeed.) I don't think everyone has to try and take sides and work out who was in the right/wrong with respect to every single one of these disputes!
I think that these stories only matter insofar as they have any relevence to road design, law-enforcement, and general road-culture in this country (very much in that order, as far as I'm concerned). I don't see this case really meets that criteria. Which is not to say this site shouldn't report it, just that there's not a lot meaningful we can say about it, in my view.
[
I read it, and thankfully haven't dribbed since i was still in nappies. But perhaps it would help to clarify my thoughts:
None of the quotes or the report itself gives any indication to the stopping abruptly or unsafe passing. And again, i'll get into my ivory tower to judge that they acted like morons and chose to assualt the driver, there is no way that can be termed 'retaliation' or anything but assualt.
So again, what _exactly_ are you basing your assumption on. Perhaps once you have gotten down from your high horse and thought about it you could give an actual answer?
It's about what side you come down on when you've made wild leaps, I mean that makes total sense doesn't it? Er....
Hmm from what you can see they seem a complete bunch of pricks and the use of the pepper spray was way beyond self defence, however, there is always 2 sides to a story which will no doubt come out at some point.
With regard to the pepper-spray - I believe this is the country that came up with the idea (and at least a few actual production models) of an anti-carjacking system involving side-facing flame-throwers mounted on the vehicle. So perhaps standards are different there?
http://edition.cnn.com/WORLD/africa/9812/11/flame.thrower.car/
Actually those flamethrowers did exist - but they were banned very quickly afterwards. as someone who was hijacked twice there in the 90's I think it's a great idea... unless you get into a panic and trigger it at a newspaper vendor at the traffic lights (they sell them to drivers that way there)
I also remember the flamethrowers. They were a serious product. There were also teargas modifications you could get. The problem is that there are a lot of "smash-and-grabs" where people standing at the traffic lights smash your window and grab whatever they can get hold of. It's very brazen and the guys re not shy about it. They walk around in the traffic looking into windows until they see something they like.
Here's a link to the flamethrower. I see it was never banned - just too expensive, so you can still buy one if you like!
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaster_(flamethrower)"
On the face of it, very nasty behaviour. Punches being thrown in the heat of an argument is one thing, but the way the team virtually queued to have their go was awful. As for the pepper-spray, that was as far from self-defence as you can get - he deliberately returned to meter the spray in the drivers eyes. Savage.
The story is starting to be told;
From, "They just started on the poor driver for no reason"
to, "Some stuff may have accidentally been thrown"
It seemed odd that this stupid behaviour was provoked by double parking
The, "They were being obstructive, but I was still able to overtake" statement is also interesting.
Hopefully we will get a believable story before the press lose interest; but I doubt it
Try Amazon... http://www.amazon.com/Cycle-Saver-Install-Bicycles-Mountain/dp/B004II61JO (in America - its illegal for anyone to carry this here!)
Those guys are probably gonna be arrogant and aggressive little pricks in pretty much every aspect of their lives. In the above example they just happen to be in cycling mode.
Sounds like you recognise yourself?
I don't know why, again, everyone is so quick to assume that the cyclists are at fault.
I suspect that more than likely the van passed the cyclists dangerously, the passengers threw water at the cyclists as this went on and then the van stopped abruptly in front of the peloton deliberately:
Retaliation followed. And while I wouldn't do it myself I'm not going to sit in ivory tower judgement.
Note also that the person videoing this is probably a "won't they get out of my way" type who was "held up", referring at the start of the video as "fuckers" ... and no I don't think he was appalled at the assault. Notice that his statement contradicts that of the driver of the vehicle quoted above:
Or, as many people seem fond of assuming around these parts, it could be that they just all insane. After all they are cyclists aren't they? And you (all) being cyclists yourselves know that they must be miscreants.
Carry on with the self-hatred.
"probably', "could be" "I suspect" ...There are a lot of possibilities aren't there?
That's life. What's instructive is on what side people come down when they make wild leaps.
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