The Citroën Club of South Africa was out in force on Sunday July 28 in celebration of Bastille Day at the Vintage and Veteran Club in Johannesburg. Held every year as close to the French national day as possible, it’s an opportunity for the marque’s diehard fans to show off their collections.
Citroën Club Secretary Joyce le Roux took her 99-year-old 5Hp Mobile to the show, but it wasn’t the oldest car there, there was one that was a century old. There were another 15 cars on display.
The week before, the 82-year-old Le Roux had driven down to Van Reenen’s Pass, the half-way point between Johannesburg and Durban for the annual Citroën Club 2CV Friends Raid in her 1937 Traction Coupe doing the 304km route back to Johannesburg in a respectable three-and-a-half hours.
In typical Citroën Club style, it was an action-packed weeken, complete with Christmas in July at the well-known Green Lantern Inn complete with Scottish pipers, and even a bit of off-road ‘bundu bashing’ for the Citroën 2CV.
The club, which was formed in 1978, boasted 300 members in its heyday with monthly rallies. Today, the membership is down to 120 people spread across South Africa, but with most of them in Gauteng.
“People are getting old; just like the cars, but we just keep on going, just like our cars,” says Le Roux who is one of the club’s most passionate members. She fell in love with Citroën in 1960 when she was courting her husband. “I learnt to drive in one,” she says, “a 1951 DS.”
She and her husband moved to Walkerville, south of Johannesburg in 1966, where they ran a garage specialising in Citroën. In 2019, when the brand celebrated its centenary, the couple went to France to celebrate with nine other members of the club.
“The cars were parked in the years (they were manufactured) around the track. It was amazing.”
She has criss-crossed South Africa in rallies, which the club calls raids, driving a variety of different Citroëns, from 2CV to the DS range and, of course her beloved cabriolet and coupe, every year for the last 30, with the only exception being the nationwide shutdown during the COVID 19 pandemic
“The members are getting older as are the cars, but these are amazing vehicles, they are terrific," she enthuses. "It’s not for nothing that when there was a survey of the top cars of the century, Citroën had 25 in the list!”
Citroën brand manager Karl Kielblock is impressed, but not surprised, by Le Roux’s passion.
“Citroën is a very special brand. It has gone through some very exciting evolutions since the first vehicle was made in 1919 – but they all remain true to the original DNA of innovation that has been part of the brand since the global introduction of mass-produced front-wheel drive in the Traction Avant in 1934 and then 20 years later with the world’s first hydropneumatics self-levelling system in the DS range in 1954.”
The brand's entry level C3 range, which was complemented in July with the South African launch of the C3 Aircross, continued this proud tradition, along with the rest of the Citroën range, says Kielblock. “We need to get Joyce behind the wheel of the C3 Aircross SUV which we launched only this month when she next goes to Van Reenen’s. I’ve no doubt it will take over where the 2CV left off when it comes to bundu bashing.
“In fact, maybe it’s time to let our latest product range line up with some of their forebears for the next Southern Cross of Africa raid that the club plans!”
