Protesters give Westlake councillor 7 days
THE CLOCK is ticking for Westlake councillor Penny East after protesters gave her seven days to respond to their demands. Yesterday police maintained a strong presence after demonstrations took place along Westlake Drive. A section of the road was barricaded.
The City of Cape Town’s Maxine Bezuidenhout said: “Steenberg Road and Westlake Drive have been closed to traffic due to violent protesting in the area. Motorists are asked to please stay away from Steenberg Road, Tokai Road as well as the Main Road intersections of Steenberg Road and to use the main road as an alternative route.”
Community leader Amanda Nobande said: “Our ward councillor has been aware of these problems for a number years and we have tried to work with her but she does not want to listen to us.” Demands include better health-care facilities, additional community centres, a taxi rank and housing.
Residents marched to the ward councillor’s offices yesterday afternoon in Constantia to hand over a memorandum. Earlier police had used rubber bullets to disperse residents after some threw petrol bombs and barricaded the roads with burning tyres.
“The community is not afraid of the police. We are fed up with living like this,” Nobande said.
She said they had given the ward councillor seven days to respond to their demands. “If she does not respond then we will take this further,” Nobande said.
The protest comes just weeks after housing and land demonstrations flared up in Mitchells Plain, Vrygrond, Hermanus and Parkwood.
Ward councillor Penny East said she would go through the memorandum.
“It’s lengthy and it contains a number of demands but I will be engaging with them,” she said.
She rejected claims that she refused to listen to the community.
“Some of their demands are fairly large projects and to say that I haven’t attended to them is not accurate,” she said.
East said she was disappointed with the events that happened yesterday.