The family of a 70-yaer-old woman who died in a freak accident at a KZN mall, talks to Sharika Regchand.
|||A gaping hole in the external wall of Pietermaritzburg’s Liberty Midlands Mall bears testimony to a dramatic and tragic truck accident on Monday night in which a 70-year-old woman was killed.
At about 10.30pm the eight-ton vehicle left the road alongside the mall, careered across the parking lot and crashed through the wall near the food court.
Estate agent Alice Jogessar, 70, who was walking to her car, was crushed by the runaway vehicle. Three other people were also injured.
The truck reportedly turned off the N3 at the Chatterton Road circle and was passing the mall. It crashed through a palisade fence, ploughed over five vehicles and crashed through the wall.
On Tuesday morning, the truck was carefully extricated.
Police spokeswoman Joey Jeevan said
while no arrests had been made, a case of culpable homicide and reckless and negligent driving was being investigated.
On allegations that the driver was speeding and that the truck’s brakes had failed, Jeevan said the claims were being investigated.
Jogessar’s family and friends were still in shock.
The “energetic” Jogessar should have had many years ahead of her, said her distraught daughter, Yurisa Jogessar.
She said that her mother, who lived alone in Mountain Rise, had retired as a teacher several years ago and later ran a crèche before joining Wakefields Estate Agents.
Jogessar sr had been to the mall to have supper with Reem Mohamed, a friend from Egypt who was visiting SA.
“She was so excited about Reem’s visit,” said Yurisa, adding that Mohamed had lived with her mother while she was an exchange student a few years ago.
Wakefields director Phil Brooker said: “It is so hard to describe somebody that is so beautiful inside.”
Having worked at the company since 2005, she had made a valuable contribution, he said.
“She was such a fabulous person. We are devastated,” he added.
The centre manager for the mall, Cassie Fourie, said that the only tenant directly affected by the incident was Absa bank, as it was feared that its wall might collapse.
Customers were advised that entrance two of the mall and Absa remained closed, but the rest of the centre continued trading as normal.
Fourie said the estimated cost of reconstruction work to the mall had not been established yet. - The Mercury