A night of passion and fun for two lovers nearly ended in a tragedy, when both of them were severely assaulted and injured, stabbed and left sprawling on the tarmac.

The incident took place at the bus rank next to a popular watering hole at a Thohoyandou shopping centre last Friday evening.

Eyewitnesses said the two were seen smothering each other intimately and explicitly at a tavern next to the Spar Bus Rank in Thohoyandou when an argument broke out between them. It was at that point revelers told them to go and solve their problem outside as they were disturbing others and had become a nuisance.

Once outside, the two continued to argue and manhandle ach other. The visibly intoxicated lovers were soon joined by a group of men who pretended they were there to help them solve their problem. One of the men started to “break up the fight” between the two by assaulting the man with his fists and later stabbing him in the back and hitting him with a brick on the head, seriously wounding him in the process.

The man started to make advances on the girl, who was also dead drunk, but she did not cooperate. She was then also assaulted with fists, kicked all over the body and also hit on the head by a brick.

Police who were patrolling the area at the time arrived and found a large crowd of onlookers gathered. They tried to wake the girl, who was still bleeding profusely, but she did not respond. Her lover could not even explain what had actually happened. Police called an ambulance, which arrived within minutes, and emergency personnel tried to stabilize the girl and to help the bleeding lover before taking them to hospital.