Riots bring anger and big damage

Several streets in Pretoria were barricaded as protests continued.

September 29, 2016

Corlia Kruger 2 minutes read

Mass rioting in Pretoria this week has left parts of the city in disrepair and the residents up in arms.

The protests were about service delivery and demands for free tertiary education at local and other universities.

Damage to university property already amounted to millions, said Higher Education and Training Minister Blade Nzimande.

Thousands of students marched through the streets of Pretoria on Monday afternoon, seeking a shutdown of tertiary institutions until their demands were met.

The protests were sparked by an announcement by Nzimande last week that universities could set their own fee increases, up to eight percent.

Nzimande said such increases would not affect to the children of all poor, working- and middle class families with a household income of up to R600 000 per annum.

This failed to placate disgruntled students, who continued their drive for free education at institutions of higher learning.

Violent protests relating to service delivery added to the chaos in Pretoria on Tuesday.

“We are now over R600 million [in] destruction,” Nzimande said earlier in the week.

“We are chasing R1 billion in property that has been destroyed over the last year and that we cannot afford.”

He said the government would have to pay for repairs, which meant money that could have been used to help the poor would have to be diverted to rebuild infrastructure.

On Tuesday, residents of Gomorra informal settlement burned tyres and used rocks to block the Daspoort Tunnel connecting western suburbs to the city.

They also barricaded Bremer Street and Van der Hoff Road in the west of Pretoria, rendering them unfit for use by motorists.

The demonstration started around 04:00 with protesters claiming the Tshwane metro had made promises it had failed to keep.

By 09:00 the situation was calm again, authorities reported.

In another outbreak of violence and destruction of property this week – three buses were shot at in Pretoria.

Two were attacked in Pretoria North and the other in Waverley, said Tshwane metro police spokesperson Senior Superintendent Isaac Mahamba.

“A bus driver from the Wonderboom bus depot heard the shots and immediately drove to the police station to report it,” Mahamba told Rekord earlier this week.

Mahamba said a white Mercedes-Benz was suspected of involvement in the attacks.

He said there were no reports of injuries in any of the attacks and police were investigating.