Cape Town - A group of about 589 refugees living at the Bellville Public Transport Interchange (PTI) are fearing for their lives after threats from security guards from the City’s department of transport and taxi operators who demanded they remove a speed fence keep them apart.
The group’s leader Caroline Hkajira said she had been called to the fence separating the two groups yesterday morning to intervene when a truck showed up intending to tear it down.
Hkajira said that’s when a rowdy group of taxi guards began to make crude threats and pick up stones as if to antagonise the group.
“A truck showed up this morning out of the blue, to take down the fence. They said the City had sent them to remove it. We didn't understand, so we tried to call the City, but could not get through to anyone. All this while our lives and families were being threatened by the people standing on the side of the taxis. They said they would bomb us and shoot us.”
Mayco Member for Transport Felicity Purchase said the site occupied by the refugees had always been the PTI holding area for minibus-taxi operators.
She said that despite the refugees living there, there was no authority in place to keep the fence on the Paint City site.
“Thus, the fence would have to be removed urgently. The site was occupied by the refugee tent at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic without the City’s consent. It is important to note that the Bellville PTI is not the only site where the Transport Directorate has removed speed fencing.”
“Unfortunately, the refugees at Paint City have been preventing the service provider from removing the speed fencing. To date, several attempts to have the fence removed have failed. The latest attempt was yesterday morning, and the matter escalated to a standoff between the taxi operators and refugees,” said Purchase.
However, Hkajira said: “I think at this point we understand that we are not wanted in South Africa and we are more than prepared to leave. We cannot go back to our countries or stay here where we are murdered.
“Our only request is for the government to allow us to leave now. We are prepared to walk to any other country as long as it’s not here. The government needs to let us go, if we try to leave on our own like the last time, they will beat us and drag us back. We can no longer live like this.”
Refugee Albert Luminga, who is a father of four, said that besides fearing for his life and what would happen to him should he be attacked, he feared for his children who would be orphaned with no documents or ways to survive in the country.
Another refugee, David Azazh said: “There are reasons why we cannot integrate back into the communities where we used to live or go back to our home countries. Everybody knows what’s happening to refugees in South Africa and in our home countries, yet they want us to choose between two deaths.”
Meanwhile, the Department of Home Affairs said through its engagements with both groups of refugees, the majority of the refugees from both groups had indicated that they would like the assistance of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to reintegrate back into communities.
“Law enforcement authorities have opted to allow immigration and UNHCR officials time to complete their work and not disrupt them by moving in at the moment.”