Settlement complains over rubber bullets
Hercules community up in arms after shacks were demolished on Thursday.
Tshwane metro police fired rubber bullets at people in Malusi 2 informal settlement in Hercules after demolishing their shacks, residents said on Thursday.
They said metro police and the so-called Red Ants entered their settlement in the morning and destroyed some shacks.
Resident Muntu Nkoana said members of the community committee earlier complained to the municipality that some residents were adding rooms to their existing shacks.
“It is those members who called the metro police and Red Ants. They caused this havoc. They themselves sold stands here for R5 000 and now they call the metro police and Red Ants to demolish other people’s shacks.”
Nkoana said the metro police and Red Ants started pulling down shacks and taking the building material. Some residents resisted, prompting the metro police to fire rubber bullets at them.
“Some people got hurt when the metro started shooting rubber bullets. They should actually be breaking down the shacks at the stands the two committee members sold for R5 000,” he said.
“People are very unhappy about the whole situation and will cause havoc tonight should they not get what they want.”
At a meeting on Thursday evening, the Malusi community was told that the metro did not heed pleas for its intervention to be postponed.
“I went to the municipality to plead with them not to demolish the residents’ shacks until all the problems have been resolved, but they did not listen,” said community committee member, Pastor James Ndlovu.
“When I got home from work yesterday after the shacks were demolished, I was blamed for what happened.”
Ndlovu said the two residents who had their shacks destroyed received notices from security officials deployed by the Tshwane metro, to take down additions they had made to their shanties.
One of the affected residents said: “After receiving my notice, I went to the municipality to enquire about the notice and they said they would come on Monday to show me how to extend my shack.
“I and the other man whose shack was demolished called an official from the community security last week Friday and he wanted us to pay R500 to him via Shoprite if we do not want our shacks demolished. When we did not do so, he sent the metro police and Red Ants.”
Ananias Sekoba, whose shack was also taken down, said he was also told to send this community security official R500 via Shoprite. He claimed several other people who extended their houses had not been touched.
“So because we did not pay the money to the official, he made sure that our shacks get demolished. This is unfair because we have children and we extended our houses so that we are not all squashed in one small shack,” said Sekoba.
The meeting called for an explanation from the authorities.
Comment from the metro police could not be obtained immediately.
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