[VIDEO] ‘We had to sleep in the rain’
The group of people who lived in the Burgershoop Cemetery was "forcibly removed".
On Wednesday morning, 9 March, a group of Burgershoop Cemetery informal settlers were “forcibly removed” from the public space by Mogale City officials.
These were the cries of Marie Hann (30) and her fellow cemetery dwellers when the News interviewed them on Thursday afternoon (10 March) on the side of the road while they where drying their clothes and blankets.
“People from Social Services and the Red Ants asked us to leave the cemetery and when we resisted they literally threw us out,” Marie alleged.
All of their belongings, including food and blankets were strewn in the street in front of the cemetery’s entrance. Security guards manned the gate to the empty grounds.
Marie showed the News where she used to sleep between aged gravestones and bushes. Her blankets were burnt, allegedly by Mogale City Local Municipality representatives.
“I was not afraid to sleep here. It’s safe,” she told the News.
Marie grew up in Krugersdorp where she later finished school at Monument High. She said she has been living on the streets for nearly two years and that she has no where else to go.
“And work is very hard to find,” she said.
The cemetery dwellers said they have never been asked to move before Wednesday. On Wednesday night, the group slept in the rain. After midnight came they huddled together under a roof in the cemetery, Marie said.
According to Marie, Sector 5 Community Policing Forum provides them with food every week, but the group of about 12 desperately need dry clothes and blankets after all their belongings got soaked on Wednesday night.
Marie said they were told the Munsieville informal settlement, that now houses previous Coronation Park’s squatters, is full to capacity and therefore they cannot live there either.
The News is still awaiting comment from the municipality.
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