Pretoria - Train commuters who pledged to protect the new “people's trains” and Metrorail infrastructure from vandalism and theft have expressed worries since an accident occurred during a process to decouple a train on Monday.
After spending at least two years using other modes of transport that were more expensive, they could not celebrate enough to have the Mabopane-Pretoria corridor recommissioned by Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula recently.
However, the accident has brought upon the people the fear of things just going wrong. Something they said they could not afford because life was harder without the much-needed trains.
Spokesperson for the Passenger Railway Agency of South Africa (Prasa) Andiswa Makanda said this was not a reason for people to panic because the accident did not happen between two trains but train sets when they were being separated.
An investigation is underway after two of Prasa's new trains collided this morning on the Mabopane line. pic.twitter.com/0nXjBNw8ZN
Metrorail spokesperson Lilian Mofokeng said the technical team upon attending to the fault by uncoupling the set experienced a roll back of the one set on to the other, causing a collision.
"The estimated cost of the damaged new rolling stock is not yet known and accessors are at the scene to make the determination. There were no damages to the infrastructure, but an investigation of the incident was under way," she explained.
Winterveld community leader Mike Ntuli said: "I think our people were panicking because of social media and people just loving to ridicule our government and make our leaders seem incompetent.
"I saw people making fun that the trains just started taking passengers but already they are colliding. However, they did not know what is the meaning of decoupling and they did not even wait to find out what happened.
"When I first heard the news from the people I actually thought there was a real accident between trains and maybe people were affected and had to wait for another train but it was not like that."
Silver Marome said he could not go back to travelling to Pretoria with taxis again because he saved so much money using trains from Mabopane station. He said this year things better go well as far as the trains are concerned.
"I am happy this was not a massive accident but I am a bit afraid because we missed these trains when they were not running. You should see the volume of people in the morning and afternoon peak hours at the Mabopane Train Station. It is people from Mabopane, Soshaguve, Klipgat, Loate, Winterveld and other areas."
Pretoria News