TouristTrap

Any of you think it will help put pressure on the govt to take action on the lawlessness, at all?

http://www.crimexposouthafrica.co.za/

littleflower15

Had a look at the website. Sends shivers down my spine. Some days I miss home and want to go back but reporting like this make me persevere with my life here.

newkiwi

i had a look at it as well. personally i think it would do better to steer clear of making too many inflammatorystatements, it is in danger of loosing credibiltiy. there are enough stories around that a level headed reporting of facts and stories will be effective. posing links to newspaper clippings and inviting personal accounts will be very effective. any statements need to be backed up with facts, so that it cant be critised as being sensationalist.
for the afrikaans speaking folk check out beeld.com under the section "my storie"
thats the sort of stuff this website needs.

TouristTrap

I agree about too much rhetoric being a bad thing.

I laud him for at least trying to do something about it though.....just wish the powers that be would get off their collective duffs instead of admiring the latest in Armani wear...fiddling whilst the country burns....

Pablo

The reaction of all the critics of this site is typical and instructive for the uninitiated. There is no denial, no strategy for dealing with it - merely the repeated litany that these things should somehow or other be hidden from the rest of the world for the good of South Africa. In other words, the response it in a similar vein to the decision to suspend the reporting of crime statistics in SA, on the grounds that the appalling figures might upset people.

The trouble with this kind of collective denial is that, in the end, reality intrudes. If the football world cup does take place in SA, the country will (presumably) be awash with thousands of naive, drunken Europeans. God help them! Because no one else will.

Pablo

TouristTrap

The site has a very interesting news report, well worth watching.

Seems that the govt has got hackers in to disable the system. Just keep bringing it up and eventually it stops kicking you off.

Amazing isn't it. The country is out of control, in a state of virtual anarchy, with only an outright civil war being worse, and he tells those who are not happy with the way they're NOT HANDLING the crime situation, to leave.

Great.

HOBSON1840

This is what I have to say about it all - I replied to that guy who tried to prove the crime expo site wrong (eventually SA Tourism took over the site - the bastards)

South Africans love to create a false sense of security and herein lies the danger.

Australians, Kiwis and many other Nations have a completely different style of living than South Africans do. For example, here in New Zealand I can hop on a bus or a train or a taxi and I will know that it is safe, reliable and clean. I also know that the taxi driver won't have cardboard for brake pads or that he won't be steering with a gun in one hand and a monkey wrench in the other - I can already hear you say that they are upgrading the taxis etc. - yeah, yeah .. they have been promising this for the last 8 years. Just as they promised that the Gautrain will be completed by 2010 (and you know that a media release a few days ago announced that it won't be anywhere near completion) or that shanty towns will be erradicated by 2006 .. LOL.

Australians and Kiwis can roam the streets at night, especially in the city centres .. what is going to happen to unsuspecting tourists during the FIFA WC in 2010 ?.. In South Africa you can't roam the streets in the city centres without being harrassed by beggers and street children carrying knives (or are you quick to forget how many tourists have been stabbed in Cape Town's city centre by street children or how many delegates were attacked in Durban while they were attending a conference). It is normal for us to do as we please and to walk where we want to here. Most tourists won't even know that you can't drive around with your window open and that you must hide your back-pack/bag under your car seat or else you are a target. In New Zealand I throw my back-pack on the seat next to me, I drive with my windows wide open and I don't bother locking the doors .. it is habit. Do you expect foreigners to know this ?

Then you make the most ridiculous statement that I have ever come across -"how come we managed to cope with the 1995 world cup? just a year after our new Parliment was elected?" ... let me tell you why ... the crime rate was much lower back then and the infrastructure had not deteriorated to the point that it is now - why don't you tell the people that cities like Cape Town and Johannesburg have weekly black-outs ? Why don't you tell us about the major traffic problems you have over there because money hasn't been spent on road infrastructure since the days of apartheid or the sprawling shanty towns that are in dire need of infrastructure ?? The Rugby World Cup can't even begin to compare to the logistics of The Soccer World Cup - catch a wake up and smell the coffee ! South Africa was better off in 1995 compared to what it is now.

Here is another wake up call - you can't expect to use an event like the Soccer World Cup to learn how other country's deal with issues, are you mad ? When South Africa bid for FIFA, the country also said LOOK we are ready and we can do it .. not LOOK maybe we can learn something from it. South Africa is beyond dangerous, maybe not to you or your fellow Saffers living in Wonderland but it is dangerous for the people visiting the Country, especially for the people who come from Countries with a different sense of security and lifestyle .. that thought never crossed you mind - did it ?

I am willing to bet that you haven't even given a thought to the 20 MILLION (Australia's entire population) people who earn less than a Dollar a day in South Africa. All you see is Gautrain (which is costing 20 billion Rand) and new stadiums (which is also costing billions) etc. The money should be spent fighting crime (paying policemen more - isn't that why they are just as corrupt as the criminals ?) and uplifting the poor. So please remember this when you are watching the Soccer Cup in 2010 and I am willing to bet that we are going to hear some horror stories coming out of SA in 2010 .. gentlemen place your bets !!

hahahaha

The site is absolute hysterical rubbish. It [AGAIN?!] uses those erroneous murder statistics apparently from the MRC and Department of Home Affairs! It AGAIN flogs the inaccuracy that SA is the world's murder capital! Sure, there are major crime problems in SA, but this website is irresponsible.

TouristTrap

Here is a first-hand account.

http://www.crimexposouthafrica.co.za...%20holding.htm

TouristTrap

The site name has changed, it is being hosted here now.

Here is an interesting blog.

http://www.southafricaiscrap.blogspot.com/

Karl2c

I understand that www.crimexposouthafrica.co.za is unofficially being targetted by SA government hackers and it keeps going down.

I have just had a look at the site link above - it is shocking to see recent pictures of Johannesburg and Hillbrow!!!! I cannot believe it is the same place I used to live in 15 years ago - gutted and torched buildings abandoned forever - Beruit after the bombing looks paradise in comparison. It is as though a plague of locusts have descended and totally demolished the place.

CRY THE BELOVED COUNTRY

Ray51

Locusts ? I believe the preferred name nowadays is AmaBenzi....?

1066

Speaking of AmaBenzi ....

http://www.allatsea.co.za/froglunch/carthief.htm

TouristTrap

Here's the new website :

http://crimexposouthafrica.org/

Pablo

I don't know if it was this site, but I made the mistake of looking at a link to a site about the continuing farm murders the other day. Dear God! The images were so disturbing I had bad dreams that night. Granny butchered, a baby set alight on its bed, a schoolboy hanged in the bathroom. Truly appalling. I wonder how long before we start hearing that farm production has been hit in SA, just like Zimbabwe.

Pablo