Cape Town – Ocean View was on a knife-edge yesterday after residents vented their anger over the death of a 7-year-old killed in gang crossfire. Four houses suspected to be drug dens and gang hideouts were set alight.
Emaan Solomons was killed by a stray bullet on Tuesday. She was laid to rest during an emotional janazah (Muslim funeral) in Ocean View yesterday. Hundreds of mourners gathered outside her family’s home to pay their respects.
Police spokesperson Novela Potelwa said two men aged 19 and 27 have been arrested following Emaan’s murder. Both suspects are expected to appear in the Simon’s Town Magistrate’s Court today.
Emaan’s fellow pupils ay Kleinberg Primary yesterday spent their break time demonstrating against the ongoing gans violence in their community.
Western Cape Education Department spokesperson Bronagh Hammond said some parents fetched their children from school early yesterday out of concern there would be more violence in the area.
Ocean View resident Sonja Alexander, whose house was among those set alighty said she did not know why her house, which is opposite that of Emaan’s family, had been targeted.
A furious Alexander alleged her house was set alight at midnight while the community gathered for prayer over Emaan’s death.
“My children were inside the house at the time.”
Meanwhile, People Against Gangsterism and Drugs (Pagad) said gangsters were attacking houses and shops in the area in retaliation to show how much power they had in Ocean View.
“It’s a bad move because now thousands more will be joining in to chase the gangsters and drug dealers out of Ocean View,” Pagad said in a statement. Supporters of the organisation had been on march through the area on Wednesday evening.
Pagad said: “It was time for real men to rise in defence of the elderly, women, children and communities.”
Potelwa said a stern warning had been issued to all communities to refrain from taking the law into their own hands as doing so would leave the police with no option but to arrest and charge those responsible. Law enforcement agencies would remain in the area until calm was restored, she said.
City Fire and Rescue Services spokesperson Jermaine Carelse said that at about 1.25am yesterday the service received a call about a house on fire in Apollo Way. he said the Kommetjie Road and Fish Hoek fire crews were dispatched.
“They were escorted to the incident and found a double storey dwelling well alight. The fire was extinguished at 3.31am. While they were there a second dwelling fire in Scorpio Road was reported.
Simon’s Town crew responded under police escort as well.
Carelse said the house had been totally destroyed by the fire and that further reports of fires in Alpha Street were received, but firefighters were advised by the police not to enter as the area was extremely volatile.
Mayco member for safety and security JP Smith said the City decided to deploysome of its Law Enforcement Advancement Plan (Leap) staff to the srea to help quell the violence.
He said that two months ago the City would not have had the spare resources to redeploy staff rapidly in response to a crisis like this, “especially when it is concurrent with other hot spot areas like Bonteheuwel, but thanks to Leap, we are now able to be more responsive to crises around the city”.
Smith said Leap’s responsibilities would include patrols, vehicle control points, tracing wanted suspects, cordon-off-and-search operations and protest-related actions.