Paramedics attending to the victim.
Image: ALS Paramedics
Tahir Thaku, a father of two and healthcare practice manager, was killed after being shot multiple times in a brazen attack witnessed by his father.
There had been a series of violent attempts on his life previously.
Thaku, 44, was shot multiple times in his abdomen in a shooting on the Chatsworth Main Road just past the Bayview off-ramp at around 1.30pm.
The POST spoke to his father, Krish Thaku, 82, shortly after the incident and when Thaku was still alive.
At the time he said that Thaku was airlifted to hospital where he was in a critical condition.
He later died in hospital.
Krish said they were driving home when they came under attack.
“My son was shot in front of me. He was in the back seat and I was driving. He was taken to hospital and we are praying for his life to be spared. He is in a serious condition,” Krish said.
Rocky Naidoo, spokesperson for the Bayview Community Policing Forum (CPF), said Thaku was seated in the back seat of his father’s vehicle and they were returning home from Croftdene when a vehicle bumped into them from the rear.
He said when Krish stopped his vehicle, a gunman jumped off from the vehicle which collided with them.
“The gunman approached Krish’s vehicle and opened fire through the back passenger’s side of the vehicle, and fired multiple shots at Thaku.
He sustained gunshot wounds to his abdomen and was in a critical condition when we got to the scene,” Naidoo added.
Claude Subramodey, spokesperson for Amawele Emergency Services, said he arrived first on the scene and assessed Thaku.
He said Thaku’s injuries were critical, and they had to summon ALS Paramedics to perform advanced life support and airlift him to hospital.
“We also treated the victim’s elderly father, who was driving the vehicle and had collapsed after he saw his son being shot. The elderly man was treated for shock and stabilised before he was transported to his home,” Subramodey said.
Thaku is a father of two and the practice manager at the Parlock Healthcare Centre, where his wife Dr Kirona Hansraj practices as a general practitioner.
He was interviewed by POST in 2024, when he survived two attacks on the same day, on December 6.
At the time, he told POST that he escaped an attempted hijacking on that morning outside the medical practice when he arrived to open the facility.
He said he had then been attacked later in the day by a man posing as a patient of his wife, who had repeatedly stabbed and beaten with a blood pressure machine.
During the attack, he had sustained fractures to his jaw, shoulder and ribs and eight stab wounds to his hands, head and back.
At the time, he told the POST that he felt like he was targeted, and he did not know if the attempted hijacking was linked to the vicious assault, which led to attempted murder charges being opened.