LISTEN: Where were you when the lockdown came?
President Cyril Ramaphosa announced the first lockdown on 23 March 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic spread like wildfire across the globe.
President Cyril Ramaphosa announced the first lockdown on 23 March 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic spread like wildfire across the globe.
In an unprecedented move, businesses and schools were ordered to close, and South Africans were told to stay home to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
South Africans were entering unchartered territory - living through the first global pandemic in our lifetime.
Jacaranda FM also had to close its office doors.
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Except for one slight difference— the radio station had an obligation to keep the music playing and the information flowing during what was, for most, the most uncertain time in their lives.
News anchor Gerda de Sousa turned her bedroom into a studio, and Jacaranda FM’s IT and Technical Manager, Andrew Pike, packed his mattress and bags to move into the office for three weeks.
No one knew how this was going to play out.
At midnight on 26 March 2020, South Africa shut down.
The Jacaranda FM news team will, over the next week, take you through a journey in time.
While it was only five years ago, it feels like yesterday and a lifetime ago all at once - a time when the pandemic truly hit home.
It was a time dominated by masks, thermometers and ‘My fellow South Africans’.
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About this series
In this special limited podcast series, the Jacaranda FM News Team reflects on the dawn of the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa. It was in the last week of March 2020 that we experienced a lockdown for the first time. President Cyril Ramaphosa announced that South Africa would implement a Level 5 lockdown to help fight the Covid-19 pandemic. Five years later, we are reminded of the impact of the pandemic and the levels of lockdown – how it changed our lives and our country forever. Listen to the new JacPod Original podcast series, Covid Chronicles: 5 years of masks, thermometers and ‘My fellow South Africans. New episodes drop each weekday this week.
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