By Buziwe Nocuze
Residents of Never Never informal settlement in Philippi were left homeless — and fuming — after a fire destroyed their shacks on Wednesday afternoon. They blame load-shedding for the inferno that devastated 130 shacks, leaving 333 people without roofs over their heads.
And as if the pain and destruction were not enough, some shack dwellers had the property that they could salvage stolen by other residents.
On Thursday morning people were sifting through the smouldering rubble in the faint hope of finding something not completely destroyed. Others started to rebuild their homes, even though the fire wasn’t completely extinguished.
Nomawethu Sawutana, a street committee member, recapped what happened. It was not long after their scheduled two-hour-long power cut had ended at 4 pm that she saw a cloud of black smoke rising over Never Never.
“As soon as electricity came back, the fire started in one of the shacks,” she said. It appeared an electrical fault set off a spark which ignited the shack. The fire spread quickly through Never Never.
“Load-shedding will be the end of us. We have lost so much already that we don’t have money to replace what we lost during the fire,” Sawutana told Scrolla.Africa.
Another resident claims that the fire was started by someone who left their stove on.
“People might say it is load-shedding, but sometimes we must take responsibility for our actions.”
“Why did the lady leave the stove on while we preach daily about the importance of unplugging electrical appliances during load-shedding?”
Sawutana said that a woman and her boyfriend went inside their burning shack and managed to bring their washing machine and television out.
But when they returned to their home to try to salvage more goods, some onlookers had stolen their appliances.
“I am furious [about that],” said Sawutana.
Another resident, Sivuyile Mbana, 45, received news of the fire while still at work. “I had to rush home, hoping that I would be able to save my belongings,” he said.
But, unfortunately he couldn’t save anything, and his shack was already destroyed by fire.
“I had just bought uniforms for my kids, and now it is gone like this. I hate load-shedding, and I wish those involved could see how it messes with our lives.”
The City’s Fire and Rescue Services spokesperson, Vennessa Scholtz, said no injuries were reported.
Charlotte Powell, the spokesperson for Disaster Risk Management, said they are still busy with assessment to find out what caused the fire.
Pictured above: Never Never informal settlement residents were left homeless after the fire broke out Wednesday, 8 February 2023
Image source: Buziwe Nocuze
