Category Archives: Elvis ka Nyelenzi

Sowetan: 100 shacks razed in fire

http://www.sowetanlive.co.za/news/2010/12/09/100-shacks-razed-in-fire

100 shacks razed in fire

Dec 9, 2010 | Elvis ka Nyelenzi

A RAGING shack fire burned about 100 shacks and a community crèche to the ground in Khayelitsha on Tuesday night.

This is the worst shack fire so far in Cape Town this summer and informal settlement residents fear that hundreds will have lost their homes by the end of the season.

Khayelitsha’s QQ Section crèche, built by the community more than two years ago, was destroyed. The only toilet in the settlement, a dry toilet bought by the community for the crèche for R3000 – was also destroyed.

Speaking to Sowetan after the fire, resident Mthobeli Qona said he called the nearest fire brigade, in Site C, Khayelitsha, as soon as the fire started, but they said they did not have water in their tanks.

“They said we must wait for another fire brigade from further away to come. It came after an hour, when all the shacks were burnt down. Everything is gone now.”

There are only five taps in the settlement of 5000 people and residents tried to stop the fire using buckets of water.

Qona hit out at the City of Cape Town, saying they had offered each family only eight wooden poles and five sheets of zinc to rebuild their shacks. “This is nothing,” Qona said.

Abahlali baseMjondolo Western Cape president Mzonke Poni, who built the community crèche in 2008, described the fire as “a direct result of the contempt in which the government holds the poor”.

Sowetan: Foreigners continue to leave in fear of attacks

http://www.sowetan.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=1159494

Foreigners continue to leave in fear of attacks
Anna Majavu, Elvis ka Nyelenzi, Getrude Makhafola and Namhla Tshisela
9 July 2010

DESPITE assurances by government officials that everything was being done to avert tragic xenophobic attacks similar to those of two years ago, nervous foreigners continue to leave.

In Cape Town yesterday, hundreds of Zimbabweans made their way to the Paarl tunnel on the N1 highway, about 80km outside of Cape Town.

They have been leaving since Monday.

When Sowetan arrived about 40 Zimbabweans had managed to get a ride on an empty bus, which had just dropped off World Cup fans in Cape Town.

The driver of the bus, headed for Durban, said he would drop the Zimbabweans off in Bloemfontein, where they would look for transport to Johannesburg.

In Gugulethu more than 10 Somali shopkeepers have fled the area. Their shops have already been vandalised, Mncedisi Twalo of the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign said.

“We are expecting the government to communicate with the community instead of using the rumours as a scapegoat. When elections come it is the only time we become important,” Twalo said.

In Alexandra, Johannesburg, a police source said they would begin intense round the clock patrols from next week.

“The problem seems to be at the RDP houses section, where locals are complaining that foreigners have houses, while they are on a long waiting list. We foresee problems there.

“We will be patrolling those areas and the rest of Alexandra to make sure that no xenophobic attacks erupt like they did in 2008,” the police official told Sowetan.

At a new RDP section people were seen moving into the new houses allocated to them.

Residents of the Ramaphosa informal settlement in Ekurhuleni confirmed that soldiers had patrolled the area on Wednesday.

Reiger Park police station communication officer Toni Perifort said the patrols by the soldiers were meant to send a message that law enforcement agencies were on high alert and to encourage residents to abide by the law.

Sowetan: Shop looting raises fears of xenophobic attacks

http://www.sowetan.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=1159460

Shop looting raises fears of xenophobic attacks
Anna Majavu and Elvis ka Nyelenzi
9 July 2010

THE spectre of xenophobic attacks threatened after the Fifa World Cup was visited early when unruly Khayelitsha residents looted a shop owned by a Somali national on Wednesday.

Sowetan arrived at the scene in J Section, Khayelitsha, just after about 50 locals ransacked the grocery shop.

Angry community members condemned the attack on the shop and said they had called the police.

J Section resident Thembi Nzi told Sowetan she was afraid for the lives of the Somali shopkeepers.

“What happened was bad. As the community, we don’t support that group who broke into the shop and stole the groceries. The problem is it’s not even gangsters. It’s residents who stay here. They did that,” said Nzi.

Lali Williams said that even children had joined in the looting.

“I don’t like it when people rob the Somali shops because whenever I need something, I buy it there. Now there is only one shop left. I am against this,” he said.

Nzi and Williams said the police arrived very quickly.

Khayelitsha’s Abahlali baseMjondolo Western Cape leader Mzonke Poni also condemned the attack.

“This was planned by faceless people who used innocent people for the wrong reasons. We do not discriminate against our brothers and sisters from Africa. They have been living in our communities for a long time.

“They have been good friends to us. We must all stand up for them and defend them so the attacks stop quickly,” Poni said.

The shop-owner did not want to speak to Sowetan.

But his brother, Noor Gulen, did.

He said: “About 50 people took everything from the shop. It is now empty. Everything is out. My brother is afraid now because he says maybe they can come back.”

Cape Town Afro-soul diva Mtika later put out this message to her Facebook fans: “Planned Xenophobic Attacks? What is wrong with us? Government must intervene pro-actively before something happens! NO to XENOPHOBIC ATTACKS!!”

Eric Ntshiqela, president of the National Informal Settlement Organisation of South Africa, also condemned the attack. He told us that “government must work with business, police, the community and foreign nationals to come up with an anti-xenophobia plan”.