SLEEPLESS nights and the sounds of gunshots and helicopters flying over suburbs have become the norm for citizens in KwaZulu-Natal and parts of Gauteng over the past few days.
Many residents have been stuck in their homes, unable to leave the area to buy food because roads have been blocked or closed due to looters nearby vandalising businesses and shopping centres and, later, setting them alight.
Those able to get to neighbouring suburbs are not being allowed through as community policing forums are asking for proof of address, allowing only their community to buy at the shops, understandably trying to keep what little reserves they have for their own.
Hospitals are battling to cope as staff have not been able to travel to work, with many health-care workers working double shifts, trying to fill in the gaps in various parts of the hospital.
Gift of the Givers Foundation chief executive Dr Imtiaz Sooliman confirmed this during a recent interview with eNCA.
KZN and Gauteng residents have never felt so alone. Ministers and other high-ranking politicians cannot relate to this very real situation on the ground because so many of them have lost touch with reality and their constituents. One would think that in this time of need, the ward councillors would be the people’s champions, but their silence has been deafening.
Residents have been left to fend for themselves. They have been securing their neighbourhoods. They have contacted their pharmacists to open for a short while in order to replenish their medication. Residents have contacted petrol station owners, also asking them to open, so that those who have been patrolling the area can refuel.
Residents have been trying to contact shop owners to open, so that people can restock their empty cupboards. Residents have rallied together to help one another. All the above-mentioned businesses have been closed for the past few days due to looting.
People’s desperation can be heard via WhatsApp neighbourhood groups, with many asking when the army would be deployed to their areas to assist them and the limited number of police keeping looters at bay.
South Africans have lost all faith in a government that has let down its citizens in their time of need.
Daily News