Pretoria - Desperate residents of the Cemetery View informal settlement have refused the help of the City of Tshwane.
The metro’s management has been trying to relocate residents after about 2 000 people were displaced following a fire that ripped through the Pretoria east squatter camp on Saturday night.
It's reported that at least two men and a 5-year-old girl died due to the fire, while some residents were rushed to hospital for the treatment of smoke inhalation and burn injuries as the inferno engulfed more than 500 shacks.
On Heritage Day, some residents were seen attempting to rebuild their homes despite the municipality’s attempts to relocate them. The City of Tshwane had previously announced plans to relocate residents and warned of possible thunderstorms.
However, the metro said some of the residents had declined the City’s offer to help them with temporary accommodation after it organised buses to transport the victims.
The municipality has, however, vowed to convince the residents to agree to be relocated. Some residents who had lost their homes were sheltered at a local church in the area.
According to Emergency Management Services, NGOs, communities around the squatter camp and religious organisations had offered to help the victims. Spokesperson Charles Mabaso said that the housing and social services departments had been activated to lend a helping hand.
“From the Emergency Management Services side, the plan to house them at the same site or any other site has not yet been shared with us,” Mabaso said.
Last month a huge fire broke out at the Bushbuckridge informal settlement in Centurion, ravaging homes, but no casualties were reported. David Farquharson, a ward councillor in the area, was at the scene and said the fire had broken out in the early hours, but he had no idea how it started.
In another incident also last month, five children were killed in a shack fire at Itireleng informal settlement near Laudium in Pretoria.
The children – three boys aged 2, 4 and 6, and two girls aged 17 months and 7 years – belonged to two sisters who were arrested for leaving the children unattended.
Mabaso had initially said the department had responded to an incident reported at about 4.26am.
“Firefighters arrived at the scene to find multiple shacks engulfed by fire, and immediately started firefighting operations. The remains of the five children were burnt beyond recognition and discovered in the ruins of the shacks after the fire was extinguished,” he said.
Pretoria News