By Everson Luhanga
Security personnel guarding the recently erected shantytown in Denver, Johannesburg, where the Marshalltown fire victims were relocated, have reportedly left, leaving the site unguarded.
When the City of Johannesburg decided to erect shacks at the site, it outsourced a security company to guard the place 24 hours every day.
But residents woke up on Saturday morning to find no security vehicles and no security personnel.
Speaking to Scrolla.Africa, Bongiwe Sithole said the place where they are staying is very unsafe.
“Behind us are disused mine shafts where zama zamas operate daily. We hear gunshots almost every night and the only thing that gave us hope was the guards who have now left,” she said.
She said they rarely see police patrols in their area. “Now that the guards have left, we are left vulnerable and we don’t know what will happen next.”
Bongiwe said when she sleeps in her room at night, she sometimes can hear zama zamas working underground.
She said she got the fright of her life on Friday when her shack started showing cracks on the floor after heavy rains that resulted in many shacks, including hers, being flooded.
Bongiwe also said people from a nearby hostel have been threatening to forcefully remove them because they claim the area belongs to them.
“Some hostel dwellers have been threatening to remove us or make us pay R300 rent if we opt to stay here. They tell us that the city made a mistake by relocating us there without informing the neighbourhood,” said Bongiwe.
The piece of land where these shacks were installed by the City of Johannesburg was bought by the Johannesburg Metro Police Department, who abandoned it.
Inside sources told Scrolla.Africa that the Metro Police could not use the place for its initial purpose as a vehicle pound because the area has a lot of criminals that would strip and even steal pounded cars.
“It was then abandoned and left to vandals who stripped the intact buildings to the ground,” said the source.
In November last year, when the city opted to relocate the Marshalltown fire victims to this site, they recruited security guards to protect the place from criminals who could steal the shacks.
One of the security guards who asked not to be named said there were 36 guards in the beginning (around November last year) when the decision to erect shacks was taken.
He said 12 guards were on night duty for a 12-hour shift while another 12 were on rotating day time duty. And the third set of 12 guards was on or off on that particular day.
He said some time in December that number was reduced to eight guards per shift. But on Saturday, the number of guards was reduced to zero, with one man who was not part of the outsourced guards sitting at the main gate.
Pictured above: Bongiwe Sithole says they are not safe as security guards have left the area.
Image source: Everson Luhanga
