Mckeed Kotlolo and Sapa

Mckeed Kotlolo and Sapa

Five people, including a child, died when a bus ran over a car on the N1 outside Polokwane yesterday, bringing the number of people killed on the country's roads since Friday to 17.

ER24 spokesman Riana Beech said the car's tyre burst while it was overtaking the bus. The bus then drove over it, injuring four other people.

Among the 17 killed this weekend were two Free State councillors who died when their car veered out of control and overturned between Vredefort and Viljoenskroon yesterday. Four people were injured.

The two dead councillors have been identified as Nketsi Moahlodi and Themba Radebe from the Moqhaka municipality in the Free State.

In Johannesburg a 29-year-old man died and five other people were injured in a four-vehicle pile-up near Dainfern yesterday, paramedics said.

ER24's Beech said a tow-truck had stopped to help at the accident scene after a VW and BMW had collided on the R511 at about 3am when another vehicle rammed into the cars.

On Friday, five people died in an accident near Fochville in North West.

Netcare 911 spokesman Mark Stokoe said two cars collided on the N12 at 2.15pm.

Also on Friday four farmworkers were killed and about 40 others seriously injured when three vehicles, including two trucks, collided in thick mist in Mpumalanga, according to police.

Three women died at the scene while a fourth died in hospital.

Police put the number of the injured farmworkers at 44 while the Life Cosmos and Mid-Med Hospital in Middelburg said they had treated 42 patients.

But hospital authorities said seven patients, three at Mid-Med and four at Life-Cosmos in Witbank, were still in hospital and the rest had been discharged.