Pretoria - The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) says more than R3 million has been paid to 445 Soweto train accident victims.
Prasa has set aside R20 million to compensate all those who were injured in the Soweto and Pretoria train accidents.
In the Soweto accident, a Metrorail train, which was travelling from Mzimhlophe station towards Phomolong station in Orlando, collided with a stationary Soweto Business Express train, injuring 857 people.
Of the 445 commuters who have been paid out, 425 have received R7 500 each, while 20 have received R10 000 each.
Prasa is expecting the number of those compensated to increase this week.
"We are satisfied with the response on the acceptance of financial assistance offered by Prasa. Of paramount importance is the need to ensure that we get our passengers back on their feet as soon as possible" said Lucky Montana, Prasa Group Chief Executive Officer.
Prasa has visited various hospitals to ensure that accident victims referred by Prasa as part of the financial assistance are looked after. All medical costs are sent directly to Prasa with no liability to the injured person.
"We've made a commitment as Prasa that all medical costs will be covered by Prasa separate from financial assistance. In addition, we have not set a limit or criteria on which injuries Prasa is willing to cover," Montana added.
"The actions by the lawyers to come into Prasa premises in an effort to pressurise train accident victims not to sign with Prasa clearly supports our position to deal directly with the train accident victims in order to ensure that the money goes nowhere else but into the hands of the train accident victims," Montana said.
