Petrol attendant pays for stranded motorist's fuel and warms SA hearts

"Thank you Nkosikho for your lovely heart. You gave me hope today for our country."

These were the sincere words of thanks offered by a motorist to a petrol attendant who insisted on paying for R100 worth of fuel because he did not want her to get stranded on a notorious stretch of road en route to Cape Town.  

Monet van Deventer shared the heartwarming story in a post on Facebook on Thursday.

She stopped at a Shell garage along the N2 highway to fill up her car but soon realised something was amiss.

“Before I asked the person to fill my car,  I got this feeling that I might have forgotten my bank card at home," she wrote.

“While I was looking for my card, a conscientious young man began to clean my windows. After the search, I told him I didn't have my card and unfortunately wouldn't be able to put in petrol."

The petrol attendant, whom she named as Nkosikho, immediately offered to put in R100 worth of fuel and pay for it himself.

"He said to me: 'You can't run out of petrol on the N2. I'll put in R100 and then you can just bring back my R100 whenever you're near again'."

"Without even being able to answer, he started to fill my car with R100 of petrol and he paid with his own card.

"He didn't ask my name or my number, he just said I had to drive safely."

Van Deventer said when she returned to the filling station to repay Nkosikho, she asked why he had paid for her petrol.

"I asked him what made him help me and how he could trust me to return the money. He answered me by saying, 'Ma'am I am a believer'." 

The encounter, she said, gave her hope for the future of the country.

The post quickly went viral, attracting tens of thousands of comments and shares.

Wimpy Badenhorst summed up much of the sentiment shared about the story.

"Such a wonderful thing to do. It really sets a wonderful example for everybody in SA. Your kindness and faith has been an inspiration," he wrote in response to the post.