Cape Town - A suspected electrical fire at a building housing squatters in the Cape Town CBD, less than 200m from Parliament, left one victim with third-degree burns.
According to witnesses, the fire at 42 Commercial Street started shortly before 10pm on Sunday. Most residents are food delivery drivers, with the blaze believed to have left half of the 200 estimated squatters homeless.
According to Ayoub Sissoko, a Malian migrant, the building had been rented by his father from its owner, Rob Barnett-Harris, in 2018. Ayoub’s father, Mamadou Sissoko, then turned the building, which used to be a factory, into a “backpackers”, renting out accommodation.
Contacted for comment about the fire in his building, an angry BarnettHarris said: “I’ve got nothing to say.”
In 2020, Mamadou Sissoko died, leaving his affairs to his wife and their children. Ayoub said two years after his father’s death things took a turn for the worse as tenants refused to pay rent for more than six months.
Eventually Barnett-Harris served the squatters with an eviction notice in November last year.
“The building has three sections, old building, new building and old block. The new building is used for backpackers, and the other two have ‘permanent tenants’.
“Since everyone refused to pay rent, every connection, including water and electricity, had become free, meaning unqualified electricians connected everything by themselves, which we now believe is the cause of the fire.”
Alexis Kapongo, from the Democratic Republic of Congo, who described himself as the building’s head of security, said the building was safe but, the problems started when squatters received another notice of eviction on May 31.
“The sheriff came here to tell us that the owner no longer wants us to stay here because the contract he had with our landlord has ended. When we confronted the new landlord, she told us the letter is fake.
“We went to the police and to court and they confirmed that everything was legal, forcing us to evacuate since we were no longer paying for our stay,” said Kapongo.
The City’s Fire and Rescue Service spokesperson, Jermaine Carelse, said the building sustained major damage to the ground, first and second floors.
In a nearby apartment block, one flat was severely affected by the fire, and one unit was partially damaged.
“An Incident Management Team was activated to assist in mitigating the event, and electricity to the building was isolated to prevent firefighters from being electrocuted.”