Municipality denies blame for Vryheid house fire
As the dust and ashes settled, Simphiwe describes hows she entered the building and discovered that the alleged source of the fire appeared to be from the distribution board in the main bedroom.
WORDS escape a grief-stricken Ntokozo Zulu, as she recalls the horror of the afternoon her house burned down.
Her 21-year-old daughter, Simphiwe Mdluli, has accompanied her to relive the tale of the Wednesday afternoon that they returned home, to an RDP house that they have lived in since 1997, to find their whole life up in flames.
Simphiwe explains that she was returning from fetching her younger sister’s school report on the afternoon of October 17, when she was met with the devastating sight of their home, an RDP house in the New Bhekuzulu location, engulfed in flames. No one was in the house at the time of the fire. However, community members, as well as the fire department, had arrived at the scene and managed to contain the blaze.
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“The whole house was burned,” states Simphiwe. “And all of our belongings…”
As the dust and ashes settled, Simphiwe describes hows she entered the building and discovered that the alleged source of the fire appeared to be from the distribution board in the main bedroom.
AbaQulusi mayor, Cllr Jerry Sibiya confirms this, stating that the procedure that they were advised to follow is, in fact, correct and that distribution boards are not the responsibility of the municipality.
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