On the face of it, our story today about a pregnant teen being left at a city bus stop after a driver refused to let her board, despite her banging on the door, seems outrageous.
Is this how we treat people?
Apparently the bus was running late and that wasthe excuse the driver gave to a friend of the teen who had boarded ahead of her. The abandoned teen, Shisana Timothy, said she was in line to get on the bus, turned for a split second and when she turned back the door was shut in her face. She banged on the door, the driver looked at her, she asked him to let her on and he refused and drove off.
She had to wait in the cold for another half hour for the next bus.
Whether he was late or not, it was obvious his was the bus she had been waiting for and his refusal to let her on is no way to treat any person, let alone an obviously pregnant young lady.
What would he hope a fellow bus driver would do if his wife or relative were in that situation? One assumes he would expect a fellow bus driver to treat that person with respect and kindness and let them board the bus.
Are our city drivers under such pressure that they cannot treat people with basic decency?
If that is the case the people running the service need to take a good, hard look at themselves and the regional council, which contracts the service, should be reviewing the matter.
In any case, the driver certainly needs to take a good, hard look at himself and if the teen's story pans out, he should at the very least be severely reprimanded.
