When a bomb blast ripped through a mosque in Soweto on Wednesday, shattering windows and forcing parts of the lush building to crash, Toto Ndlovu (32) thought a car had just crashed into her home.
When she walked out of her house, which is near the mosque, in the early hours of the morning she could not see properly as smoke and dust clouded her vision. “We were asleep and woke up when we heard the loud sound. We thought somebody had driven into our home,” she said.
What it was, in fact, was one in the series of nine bomb explosions on Tuesday night in Soweto. One woman died from flying debris and a number of people were slightly injured.
Ndlovu, a mother of two, says it did not take long before the police arrived at the scene. “The police told us to move away from the scene because they feared yet another bomb blast. We were also told to remain outside, away from the mosque, for about three hours while they checked the area for more bombs,” she said.
Ndlovu lives a stone-throw from the Musjid al-Ummah mosque in Dhlamini, one of the areas that came under bomb attack just before midnight on Wednesday.
The Soweto blasts destroyed railway lines, making railway access to and from the sprawling township impossible. In the Protea South squatter camp 42-year-old Claudina Mokone was killed in her sleep and her 51-year-old husband Simon Mukhathi sustained serious injuries.
Josephine Monareng, the deceased’s neighbour, said she woke up at midnight after hearing a whistling sound, which was followed by a loud thump. “It was around 12 o’clock. We were asleep, we first heard something that sounded like firecrackers, then a loud bang. I knew right away that it was a bomb.”
Monareng says she rushed to Mokone’s house after the deceased’s daughter Mary called out for help. “Inside the house there was blood all over. Mam Marry’s [Mokone] head was crushed open and her brain was spilling over. The man [Mukhathi] was bleeding on his face, his mouth swelled up and he was also hurt on his chest.”
Mukhathi was taken to Chris Hani Baragwanath hospital shortly after the incident. Earlier an explosive device was discovered in a tog bag near a disused petrol station in Dhlamini, and was defused before midnight by a police disposal unit.
In Bronkhorstspruit, east of Pretoria, a detonator exploded in the basement of a section of the Nan Hua Buddhist temple. Construction workers John Selemela and August Ntuli had found the bomb in a military rucksack and tampered with its detonator.
Seconds later the detonator went off and 10kg of explosives was later recovered by police. The men sustained slight injuries. News of the Bronk-horstspruit bomb blast came as Minister of Safety and Security Charles Nqakula, Minister of Justice Penuell Maduna and Minister of Intelligence Lindiwe Sisulu were addressing the media at Protea police station.
Nqakula said the bomb blast at the Musjid al-Ummah — which he and the other ministers later visited — was the first one to strike, at 11.55pm. It was followed by another explosion on a railway track 400m from New Canada railway station just after midnight.
Four other explosions occurred at Midway railway station and on Lenasia railway lines.
Nqakula said experts were drawing up a profile of the perpetrators but declined to speculate on suspects or possible motives, in fear of inciting revenge attacks or public panic.
On Wednesday most Soweto residents told the Mail & Guardian that they believed the bombings were meant to spark a reaction from black people. One resident said: “This attack was largely an attack on blacks and the people responsible for this chose their targets very carefully.”
Other residents were puzzled about to why the mosque was targeted. The explosion at the mosque left a hole in one side of the building and was so strong that windows of nearby houses, including Ndlovu’s, were shattered.
Window frames were covered with plastic bags and cardboard boxes to close off the openings. Gladys Maseko, Ndlovu’s neighbour, says she was too scared to go outside after the blast.
“We heard a rumbling sound. I thought it was lightning and told my children to switch off the television because I didn’t want my TV to be damaged,” she said.
“My children told me that it was not lightning. They thought the noise was coming from gun shots. But also it sounded as if something had hit the roof of my house,” Maseko said.