“I kept screaming ‘Help, help, they are trying to kill me’ while I ran down the street.” These were the chilling words of Congolese born Simon Balume after he was brutally attacked and stabbed in a xenophobic attack in Durban recently. Simon’s story is mirrored through similar attacks of African immigrants that has sent shock waves across the nation.

They were attacked because they were deemed to be from the wrong part of Africa, because they were makwerekweres (derogatory term for foreigners).

Simon, who works as a car guard at the Checkers on Mackeurtan Avenue, was unlocking the door to his flat when he was surrounded by four angry men.

“They were shouting at me and calling me makwerekwere and they were trying to prevent me from opening the door. They threatened to kill me. They shoved me around and one of the men hit me with a stick. They began to beat me and I felt something sharp pierce my back as I ran out into the street screaming and pleading for help with a blood soaked shirt,” he said.

Simon was taken to King Edward Hospital but endured more anger and outrage, this time from patients who again told him to ‘go back from where he came from’.

“I’d like to go back to my country, but not like this. I left the Congo because I was forced to fight for the militia. We’d wake up every morning not knowing who we were fighting. We were just shooting. The commander said the people we were fighting were from other parts of Africa.

“I lost many of my friends in the fighting and so I left that life behind me to try and make a living here in South Africa,” he said.

His fellow countrymen, Allan Kandolo, a board member of the Social Integration of Immigrants in South Africa (SIISA), an ngo based in Effingham, expressed his sadness over the xenophobic attacks.

“It affects everyone, I don’t see the arguments put forward by the South African people. We have to remember we are all foreigners somewhere. The most shocking thing for me personally throughout the furor is that people I’ve counted as friends have told me to leave. We are brothers and sisters yet there is so much hatred.

“We will go back to our countries someday but for now, we will stay and try and call Durban, home,” Kandolo said.