By Karen Breytenbach
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
With his four cousins, Chamiso fled Zweletemba with only their wallets and cellphones. They lost their refugee permits, business papers, financial records, identity documents and driver's licences.
They slept on a municipal lawn for three nights before finding temporary lodgings in Bellville. The Cape Town Refugee Centre, which is funded by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, gave the men a month's rent and food money. After that, they were on their own.
Maybe we will sleep on the street. What will we eat? We have nothing. How can I start a business again? I have nothing left, nothing. Who will give us money?
"We have lost our humanity in Worcester."
As one drives from the bustling town of Worcester, where hundreds of street vendors clog the pavements selling cheap Chinese imports, through the industrial area and into the peaceful township by the only access road - a bridge over a waterless, pebbled riverbed - it is hard to imagine that this place, where the shacks have neat gardens and children play in the streets, could have been the scene of violent all-night looting of 23 foreign-owned shops.
Foreigners, about 20 from Somalia, 15 from Ethiopia and a handful from Zimbabwe, the Congo, China, Pakistan and Bangladesh, were driven away on the night of Friday, March 7.
The violence is said to have erupted after two shooting incidents in which a teenager was killed and a woman injured. Two Somalis have been arrested, one on a charge of murder and one on a charge of attempted murder. Both were released on bail and are scheduled to appear in Worcester Magistrate's Court again on April 25.
| 'Police did not arrest anyone even though they knew of and witnessed the theft or looting' |
Locals looted all the foreign-owned shops in the township.
Abdi Nur Abdi, who owns the now-flattened shop where the teenager was killed, said the same group of youngsters had robbed the shop three times.
He said he had reported the cases to the police, but the police had done nothing to protect his shop.
Joyce Tlou, co-ordinator of the Human Rights Commission Non-Nationals special programme, lamented: "What if next time it is women, or old people, or the disabled? Why do we have double standards when foreigners are involved?"
Tlou said it was important to teach police officers across the country about their duty to protect refugees, who had the same rights as citizens, apart from the right to vote or run for office. One of the first organisations to offer aid to the affected refugees was Islamic Relief.
Abdi and a large group of fellow Somalis also asked the University of Cape Town Law Clinic to take up their case.
Fatima Khan, refugee rights project co-ordinator at the law clinic, appointed a team, comprised of lawyers and researchers, to investigate the case.
Khan said the refugees' case would be taken to the Equality Court and it would be argued that the police had been unfair in its discrimination.
"Our intention is to seek compensation for our clients as well as force police to in future be informed that it is incorrect and unconstitutional to refuse to provide protection to a person on the basis of his or her nationality.
"Furthermore, it is true that police did not arrest anyone even though they knew of and witnessed the theft or looting. Items as big as fridges and counters were stolen, and police have made no attempt to investigate or recover stolen goods."
Worcester Municipality representatives, local community leaders, NGOs, human rights lawyers and religious leaders have met affected refugees and the community to discuss how the situation can be resolved.
But those ejected from Worcester seem to be stuck in a political quagmire while they wait for answers and aid.
Sifiso Mbuyisa, the director of Social Dialogue and Human Rights in Premier Ebrahim Rasool's office, said it was difficult to address the situation, because the refugees and migrants were not homogenous, and even the Somali community was divided.
Since all those affected were not sticking together, the government and the NGO sector did not have a single forum to communicate with and to provide assistance to.
Mbuyisa, who is a trained conflict mediator, said he encouraged some Somalis from Zweletemba and representatives of Islamic Relief he had met on Friday to get together all those who were affected to lobby the government.
Similarly, different departments in national government and the various levels of government were also acting separately and therefore their efforts were also not co-ordinated, he said.
South African shopkeeper "Lani" Rasi, whose parents own Vukuzenzele Spaza Shop, said it was as though the community "were just hungry for violence".
He believed it would be safe for the foreigners to return, because the mayor and local pastors told the community to reconcile with them.
At one of two community meetings held since the attacks, the community said the foreign shop-owners could come back on condition that they do not open shops right next to South African shops, that they employ South Africans "for the sake of communication" and that they involve themselves in community affairs by attending community meetings, Worcester police spokesperson Captain Mzikayise Moloi said.
Moloi said the Somalis would be given an opportunity at the next community meeting to explain their needs and side of the story. A date had not yet been set.
Members of the local Community Policing Forum (CPF) and religious leaders had offered to act as mediators.
Moloi said the perception of many locals that Somalis were murderous and intent on "killing our children" was an issue that needed to be addressed. "Locals don't acknowledge how many people their children have killed," he said.
Problems with troubled and unemployed youth were addressed at a provincial government imbizo in Worcester last week. Unemployment was rife in the small township, which is home to about two-thirds of the town's population.
Many foreigners alleged the police had failed to protect them, incited violence and refused to take their statements or follow up on initial affidavits about what they had lost, even after they told the police where to find their stolen belongings.
Moloi said he had heard of complaints about the police, but no one had brought the police any proof yet of incitement by a police officer.
"If there was such a police officer, people must come forward with information. We must remove any bad apples. If they are not happy with how the police dealt with the situation, they mustn't just complain, they must come and speak to the station commissioner. Many are blaming the police, but they don't understand South African law," said Moloi.
Worcester Mayor Charles Ntsomi said he was aware of complaints about the government and the police's inadequate response to the situation.
He said he had encouraged the police to recover "at least one fridge to restore some trust in the police".
Ntsomi, of the ANC, said if councillors who had failed to assist the foreigners were to be disciplined and suspended, by-elections would have to be held that could tip the delicate political power balance in the council, as it happened in Stellenbosch. Also, the allegedly xenophobic community was a valued part of the electorate.
"We are close to election time now," he said.
Ntsomi said many organisations had come to assess the situation, but offered no help, he said.
"They (the ejected foreigners) must register their cases with Social Development. They can also come to me and apply for emergency relief, because we have some funds, although these are very limited and intended for shack fires, floods and so on. Winter is around the corner."
Ntsomi said assistance for the foreigners was really the responsibility of the national government with "all its resources".
Hector Yebo of the Breede Valley Youth Desk, said anti-xenophobia workshops might be hosted in Zweletemba before the end of the month. The municipality would provide a venue and funds. From there, the initiative would be branched out to Roodewal, the traditionally coloured area, he said.
The Cape Town Refugee Centre, in co-operation with the Human Rights Commission, is also planning to hold workshops in Worcester.
"In the long term, we would like to see that all the NGOs working in Worcester are supported. We also need to start advocating human rights and talk to South Africans about foreigners' rights," said the refugee centre's director Christina Henda.
Henda said the refugees were "highly traumatised, angry, irritable, distrustful and confused", and needed urgent debriefing.
UNHCR protection officer Monique Ekoko has conducted interviews, the Cape Town Refugee Centre and the Scalabrini Centre had visited Worcester a few times to assess the situation, Africa Unite made a proposal to the municipality to host anti-xenophobia and empowerment workshops for township youth and the UCT Law Clinic has taken statements from several witnesses, on a mandate by the Department of Social Development, to draw up a list of affected foreigners and their losses, among others.
The UCT Law Clinic was also investigating claims that the police were either negligent in protecting the foreigners' property or actively involved in inciting violence.
Duncan Breen of the Consortium for Refugees and Migrants in South Africa (Cormsa) said the Worcester attacks seemed to fall into the same pattern as other recent xenophobic attacks across the country.
"There appears to have been tension building for a while, and it just took a trigger to ignite into mob violence. One of the common challenges we see is that many foreign nationals and South Africans have very little interaction, which allows negative stereotypes of foreign nationals to remain unchallenged."
One Somali man said all he wanted was to see someone taking action instead of just asking a bunch of questions.
"Please take pictures of my shop for me," Thomas Chamiso asked the Cape Times last week. "I'm too scared to go back there."
The Cape Times found the shop, but all that remained was a small brick back office and the facade, sporting the name of the shop, starkly silhouetted against the bright blue sky.
The space where the shop once was is now used as a messy, open-air storage area for building materials.
The property owner, known in the neighbourhood only as Bacingele, sells shack-building materials.
He had a deal with Chamiso to rent him the space for eight years.
While the looters had torn down mainly the part of the structure built by some Ethiopian cousins, Bacingele also suffered damages of about R5 000.
"I was fighting to keep my stuff. They took my zincs. They just took everything … a mob of more than 100."
Before the Cape Times left, he asked how his former tenants were doing in Cape Town and took a R20 note from his pocket.
"Give this to Thomas and tell him to buy a cooldrink. Tell him they must come back. We miss them," he said.
An elderly neighbour, who leaned over the garden fence, said he, too, wanted the shopkeepers to return.
"They were good people and their prices were good. We bought on credit. Where must I buy my bread and airtime now?"
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Source: Cape Times, April 15, 2008