Gautrain - Improved public transport set to boost commercial activities and escalate Property Values (COSMOCITY)

According to the Gautrain Management Agency, it is planning to extend the rail route by 150 kilometres over the next twenty years, including routes through Randburg, Fourways and Soweto. A proposed new line will connect Mamelodi (Irene) with the current network, branching off from Sandton, Randburg, Cosmo City, the Cradle of Human Kind and Lanseria.

Pretoria’s Bus Rapid Transport System – A Re Yeng – which was introduced in 2014 – has also done much to improve transport in and around Tshwane. Dos Reis Marques notes that a number of businesses have opened along the bus routes as accessibility improved.

Don’t overestimate your property value

“While the new property developments and the proposed improvement of public transport will likely have a good impact on property prices in Gauteng in the long run, we’re finding that sellers are assuming that buyers will pay unrealistic prices for homes”, says dos Reis Marques, “Buyers are very savvy and a house that’s not priced properly won’t sell. My advice to sellers remains to ask the advice of a qualified estate agent in terms of getting a realistic valuation.”

Dos Reis Marques also advises first time buyers to get pre-approval for a home loan before house hunting; “Knowing what you can afford, and importantly how much a bank is willing to loan you, will save a lot of time when it comes to buying your first property – there’s no point in making an offer on a property you can’t possibly afford. So do your homework before you start doing the legwork.”

COSMO CITY DONATIONS Stem from Trinityhouse Randpark Ridge spares time to help the less fortunate

RANDPARK RIDGE – The school recently took part in the annual Mandela Day when they packed lunches, made soup and delivered those and beanies to children in need.

Trinityhouse Preparatory Randpark Ridge grate vegetables as their bit for Nelson Mandela Day. 

Trinityhouse Preparatory and High School Randpark Ridge  took part in their annual 67 Minutes for Mandela Day initiatives.
The preparatory school participated in a soup-making initiative during which the youngsters washed, peeled and grated various vegetables. Once grated and collected, the vegetables were taken home by a number of generous parents who cooked the vegetables into a delicious soup.

Marketing officer, Robyn Aingworth, said Sunbake donated 100 loaves of bread which were added to the 100 loaves donated by the school. “During assembly on 28 July, Trinityhouse Preparatory handed over 600 litres of vegetable soup and 200 loaves of bread to Kids Haven,” said Aingworth.

She added that the high school supported Mandela Day as they collected lunch packs and beanies. The lunch packs were prepared by the students and packed during school. Aingworth explained that 1 368 lunch packs and 633 beanies were donated to 17 different schools in Zandspruit, Kya Sands, Cosmo City and Soweto.

Trinityhouse Preparatory classes grate some vegetables.

“A number of teachers and students dropped off the items at the various schools and were welcomed with big smiles and many hugs.”

Aingworth concluded that it was great to see all the children, staff and parents supporting Mandela Day and made a difference in the community.

COSMO CITY - Police response and patrol mayhem Honeydew CPF Sector 2 appeals for prioritisation as the suburb remains high in the crime stats.

Honeydew CPF Sector 2 manager Sergeant Nicholas Makhura said residential crimes have peaked, according to police stats.

The shortage of patrol vehicles and manpower at the Honeydew Police Station has been labelled as the main cause of the sky-rocketing criminal activities in the police precinct.

The station came under fire after the residents complained that they wait long hours for a response vehicle to attend to their complaints.

An informant from the Sasol garage near Clearwater Mall, where a Mercedes-Benz was hijacked on 19 July, told the Northsider that the victim had to wait five hours for a police vehicle to get to the scene. Fortunately, the vehicle was recovered hours later in Kagiso, west of Johannesburg, after the victim’s tracking company detected its whereabouts.

Read article here: Man watches robbers drive away in his Mercedes Benz

The issue of insufficient resources was tackled at a Honeydew Community Policing Forum (CPF) Sector 2 meeting on 28 July, where members pleaded for support from the police. Areas such as Weltevreden Park and Randpark Ridge required prioritisation as these areas have been subjected to constant house-breakings and dog-poisoning incidents.

Sergeant Nicholas Makhura, the Honeydew Sector 2 manager, again indicated that the area still had a serious problem with residential robberies.

He said house robberies topped the charts in the whole station this month. “House and business robberies were the biggest contributors to the crime rate this month, compared to the same period last year,” said Makhura.

CPF Sector 2 acting chairman, Neville Burnett, criticised the police for only utilising its resources in Cosmo City. “I believe the station is not giving us what we need. This is not on! We are not getting the support that we need. We got to put our foot down. We can’t carry on like this, crime has increased,” he complained.

He added that this matter should be addressed with the station commander.

The lack of police vehicles also created a problem for security personnel, who stated that police response time is poor and they take too long to trace number plates.

Honeydew Police spokesperson, Captain Balan Muthan, responded to the issues. Muthan indicated that some areas in the sector are bigger than others. “People need to understand that the Honeydew police precinct is a very big area which also polices Zandspruit and Cosmo City. The area has six sectors and each sector has two vehicles for patrols.”

He also reflected on how police operate. He said police attend to all complaints; however, there will be times where members prioritise according to the incidents. “A theft that has already occurred will not be as serious as a theft or robbery in progress.

Also, don’t expect that as you put down your telephone, you will have a police van at your doorstep,” Muthan explained.
Muthan further explained that police are taken to task if they fail in their duties. “Our reaction times are monitored on a daily basis, and if a reaction is not within the go period, then the commander or driver is held responsible,” he concluded.

Do you perhaps have more information pertaining to this story?Phone us on 011 955 1130.

Ubuntu clinic for moms and babies soon to be micro-franchised -Most of our clients are from Cosmo City

A passion for caring for people led Freda Makanete to open a clinic that started in a Wendy house.

Ubuntu Health Care Clinic is a mother and baby clinic. We provide a service to women who mostly don’t want to go to the public sector clinics owing to the time they spend there. So the service we offer is antenatal care for pregnant women. We take good care of them throughout their pregnancy. Should there be any complications, because it’s a midwife practice, we refer them to obstetricians in government hospitals. And for those with medical aid, we refer to the private sector. As a midwife my duty is to just go through the primary healthcare of the mother and, should there be any complications, it is my duty to refer them to the obstetrician – that’s why we then refer them to the hospital.

So that’s what a public clinic would be like. The midwife in the public space would then refer to the obstetrician; that’s how we work. After the mother gives birth she will be coming back. So birth will be for those who want to go to public sector. Mostly we don’t have mothers who give birth in the private sector, since we don’t have obstetricians we work with directly to take care of the mom through the antenatal period, and then the mothers only go there to give birth.

Usually we will see them early in their pregnancy and then later on they will go to the obstetrician. Most of our moms deliver in Rahima Moosa Mother and Child Hospital, and then others at Johannesburg General and Hillbrow. Most of our clients are from Cosmo City, so those from that area will deliver in Rahima Moosa. Depending on where the woman lives, we refer them to hospitals according to their address, because that’s how the referral system works with public hospitals.

After they give birth they will come to us for their three-day check-up. We don’t do the HIV programme as yet, so we still refer them for that. Should a mother be found to be HIV-positive antenatally, we refer her to be initiated on ARVs, although the moms still prefer to come back to us for antenatal check-ups, and continue their ARV check-ups with the public sector. So even after birth we do advise them. They will come back for their six-week check-up and, if they can pay, we do the PCR test. But if they can’t pay we refer them back to the government institutions.

Immunisation and wellness check-ups for moms and babies

Then we also offer immunisation services for the babies, and the moms come back for their six-week check-ups as well, for a Pap smear. We will continue with them if they want to do contraception as well. There are other little things that we also do, like wellness check-ups. So if the mom is on blood pressure tablets or wants to check her blood pressure with us, we do blood pressure and sugar tests because at times there are complications with moms who are pregnant, and we find they have diabetes or hypertension. So if that needs to be monitored we do monitor that as well.

Then with the babies we provide services for them until they are 12 years old with their vaccinations. For our vaccines we partly get our stock from the government side and we don’t charge much for it; we charge just for the consultation fee and not for the vaccines. But there are other vaccines like the chicken pox vaccine, the MMR vaccine, that you find in the private sector. So we buy those vaccines and then we charge. So we do see cash clients and medical aid clients.

COSMO CITY - POLICE HUNT SUSPECTS WHO KILLED PARENTS IN FRONT OF CHILDREN

Police say the children were sitting around a fire in their yard in Cosmo City when three gunmen jumped over the wall on Tuesday night.

Police are following up leads after a couple was shot dead at their Cosmo City home in full view of their four children.

Police say the children were sitting around a fire in their yard when three gunmen jumped over the wall on Tuesday night.

When one of the children tried to alert their parents, one of the gunmen shot them both in the head.

The gunmen stole a plasma television.

The learning revolution GAUTENG – Find out how Learning Alive is improving education in South Africa, one lesson at a time.

Imagine that you were preparing a meal for your family. You find a great recipe, go out and buy all the freshest ingredients that you will need and go home to get busy in the kitchen. Then you realise that the pot that you are trying to cook in has a giant hole in its bottom and is leaking.

This is how Ann-Marie Olufuwa, programme manager for the Learning Alive non-governmental organisation (NGO), explains what she and her organisation are trying to do for the youth of South Africa.

“The leaky pot is a metaphor for the mind of a child who is just being taught the facts,” Olufuwa explained. “In order for education to be effective, we have to nurture a growing mind, as well as teach it the facts.”
Learning Alive aims to foster this support for underprivileged schoolchildren with supplementary education lessons which take place outside of mainstream school hours. These courses are linked to the mainstream curriculum, so that it is still relevant academically, but hopes to have a bigger impact on the individual.

The children from Moputa Secondary School begin each Learning Alive lesson with an interactive game like charades.

The NGO offers classes to children who most need support across Gauteng, including Saturday classes in Soweto, Midrand and Cosmo City and after-school classes in the Diepsloot area since 2011.

Since April, Learning Alive has been hosting after-school lessons as part of the English Access Microscholarship Programme at Moputa Secondary School in Midrand.

There are 22 children in each of the classes that Learning Alive run at Moputa Secondary School in Midrand, one for Grade 9s (pictured) and one for Grade 10s.

Sponsored by the United States Department of State and spanning 85 countries worldwide, this programme not only aims to help schoolchildren develop their English but also helps them grow holistically with emphasis on developing leadership skills, critical thinking and the practical use of the knowledge learned in the classroom.

“The American Embassy has provided the funding that allows us to provide 44 Grade 9 and Grade 10 children here [at Moputa Secondary School] with two-year Microscholarships [for these lessons],” explained Sanette van der Merwe, one of the Learning Alive teachers who works with the Moputa children twice a week after the official school day has ended.
She and her colleagues, including Reuben Makhosonke Xaba who also teaches the Moputa children, host their lessons twice a week, for two hours per lesson. “We try and start each lesson with a game,” Van der Merwe added. “In order to nurture teamwork and to help the kids learn more through play. Even though we haven’t [been teaching these children long], it’s amazing to watch how each child is developing, and growing more confident as we go along.”

School holidays: 9 gratifying, non-digital things for kids to do

If you like the work that Learning Alive is doing and would like to support them, they are always looking for help! Donations of books, learning materials, food (as each child is provided with a meal during extra lessons) and classrooms for the lessons to take place in.

For more information, visit their website www.learningalive.co.za; 076 358 2634; info@learningalive.co.za

Daily protests run JMPD off its feet

Police officers are seen walking along the N14 highway near Diepsloot where residents took to blocking the roads and highway during a service delivery protest, 10 July 2017, Johannesburg.

Service delivery demonstrations have escalated in Gauteng in recent months.

Johannesburg Metro Police Department (JMPD) officers have been sent to handle community protests over lack of service delivery almost every day in recent months, spokesperson Inspector Edna Mamonyane said yesterday.

Since March this year, many parts of Gauteng have been hit by service delivery-related protests, mostly in the south of the province.

Yesterday, Mamonyane said that recently JMPD officers have been going to between four and five community protests daily.

“The protests, which have mainly been about service delivery and land invasions, have had a negative effect on our day-to-day operations.

“We have had to divert some of responsibilities from the roads, as well as fighting crime,” she said.

Last week, the areas affected by protests included Meyerton, in Midvaal, where residents of the Sicelo informal settlement barricaded the busy R59 highway with rocks and burning tyres.

Not far from there, residents of Cosmo City blocked off the old Vereeniging road, the R82.

In Lenasia, residents were also engaged in similar demonstrations as were those in parts of Soweto.

Yesterday, some Diepsloot residents were struggling to get from their homes to work after protesters barricaded the N14 highway and the R511.

According to Mamonyane, yesterday’s protest, which started at 4am, was about electricity and water.

“Since March, we have seen protests spreading to different parts of the province and that has put a strain on our daily operations,” Mamonyane said.

Some other areas that have been affected since March are Ennerdale, Sebokeng, Boipatong and Eldorado Park, all in the south.

Others closer to Johannesburg that have been the site of protests included Roodepoort, Alexandra and Marlboro.

Meanwhile, Metrorail in Gauteng announced that the suspension of train services between Vereeniging and Johannesburg has been lifted following violent protests near Midway, where two lives were lost, including that of a security official.

Train operations along that line resume today, but only between Vereeniging and Midway.

“Commuters are requested to take note that it is still unsafe to operate trains between Midway and Johannesburg.

“All relevant stakeholders are working with community leaders in Klipspruit to ensure the situation improves in the interests of fully restoring the service to normal,” Metrorail said in a statement.