Category Archives: fire

Daily Maverick: Between frying pan and fire: Cape Town’s shack dwellers

It’s the festive season for all, but for some, who live in close proximity and without electricity, it’s also fire season. In the last week, hundreds of Cape Town people have lost their homes in shack fires, and they won’t be the last. Meanwhile, emergency service delivery is facing challenges of its own. By MARELISE VAN DER MERWE.

In just over a week, the latest fire in Kosovo, Cape Town, left 120 people homeless. The chairman of the community leaders’ forum, Lonwabo Jako, blamed the same resident for devastating fires in 2013 and 2014. In Masiphumelele, meanwhile, another 40 homes were destroyed and 110 people left homeless, with the City of Cape Town and a number of NGOs delivering emergency relief. That fire spread after a stove was left unattended. Continue reading →

Two Lives Lost in a Shack Fire in Bhambayi, Inanda

14 December 2016
Abahlali baseMjondolo Movement SA Press Statement

Two Lives Lost in a Shack Fire in Bhambayi, Inanda

The festive season is the time for most people to gather with families and friends, but for those of us who are poor and living in shacks this is only a dream. We have to watch our shacks so that they do not get burnt while others are celebrating. We have to protect this because it’s all we have.

We also have to safeguard our homes against the illegal evictions that are carried out by the municipality’s land invasion unit. We are still living in shame 22 years post apartheid. It is unfortunate that the very government that our parents entrusted with their vote is still abusing their dignity and their basic human rights. The Freedom Charter committed the liberation struggle to provide land and housing to the people. The right to housing is a right that is enshrined in the Constitution but this right has not been properly addressed by this current government. We are often told that we must be patriotic about our country but how can you be patriotic when your stomach is empty? How can you be patriotic when you do not have a roof over your head? Recently on the 10th of December 2016 the country celebrated 20 years since the Constitution was adopted. This beautiful Constitution has not been properly implemented. This is because the people in power are only interested in serving themselves and their families.

Continue reading →

The Burning Season is Here

05 July 2016
Abahlali baseMjondolo Movement SA

The Burning Season is Here

Shack fires are a constant danger. But that danger becomes more serious in winter. This is because during winter people who are living in shacks are trying to keep warm. As a result people resort to making fires which increases the risk of their homes being burnt. There was a serious fire in the Foreman Road settlement in Durban in the past month leaving hundreds of people destitute. On Sunday five people lost their lives in the fire that burnt down the Plastic View settlement in Pretoria. On the same day another fire broke out in the Kenville settlement in Durban which left 76 families without homes and their documents, work clothes and school uniforms burnt. Continue reading →

News 24: Cape Town fires kill 9, displace thousands on Christmas weekend

2015-12-28 06:22

Kaveel Singh, News24

Cape Town – Several fires in Cape Town over the weekend have left nine people dead and
thousands displaced.
The most heavily affected areas included Elsies River, Delft, Mfuleni, Vrygrond, Imizamo Yethu Informal Settlement as well as Cape Town Station.

On Saturday alone, eight people were killed after shack fires engulfed various parts of Cape Town in the morning.

A total of three men, three women and two girls were killed in four different areas, spokesperson Theo Layne had said. Continue reading →

The Transit Camp is a Form of Social Control

Published in The Mercury as ‘The Dynamics of Informal Housing’ on 12 December 2015.

The Transit Camp is a Form of Social Control

Richard Pithouse

Development is often held up as the answer to some of our most pressing social problems. Corruption is often seen as a key threat to attaining the efficient ‘delivery’ of developmental gains. But development and corruption are often – although of course not always – phenomena best understood as strategies for securing political containment. Continue reading →