Blaze leaves six families homeless
A house fire left six families destitute after a fire broke out in Bertrams on Sunday, January 18.
Ward councillor Clr Carlos Da Rocha said the Bertrams fire broke out at about 1pm on Sunday.
One of the tenants, Ms Nokuthula Masondo said, “I am unsure how the fire started, but all I know is it started in one of the rooms after I had fetched my phone’s charger. After plugging in the phone, I noticed the fire.”
She said all their belongings were destroyed, including their identity documents, birth certificates and asylum papers.
“Our children can’t go to school now because their uniforms and books were destroyed in the fire,” said Ms Masondo.
Mr Lucilio Mumhamha said they could not save anything as the fire spread quickly through the house.
“All we could do was make sure that everyone was out of the house and safe. One of the women we share the house with came out running and we called the fire department, but they did not come. Someone had to drive out and go to the fire station to call the firemen. Had they came earlier, I believe we could have saved some of the items in the house,” he said.
Johannesburg Emergency Services spokesperson, Mr Robert Mulaudzi, said according to the call centre records, they never received a call about the house.
“We only went there after someone came to the station to tell us about the fire, but no one called our call centre,” he said.
He urged people to call the emergency numbers as soon as possible in order to be assisted in time.
The Johannesburg emergency numbers are 10177, 112 (the cellular phone emergency number for Cell C, MTN and Vodacom) or 011 375-5911.
Clr Da Rocha is appealing to other community members to help with donating clothes, books and food as the families try to get on with their lives.
He also urged people to not occupy over crowded houses.
“There are six families staying in that house, with children. They don’t know how the fire started but the minute you have so many people in one house, there are bound to be incidents like these. Landlords are just collecting money, they don’t do anything to ensure the houses are secure and safe. City council is also not doing anything to deal with slum lords and over-crowding. They are not enforcing the law,” said Clr Da Rocha.
