PMB hospitals targeted in July unrest
The most recent evidence emerging from the South African Humans Rights Commission (SAHRC) hearing into the July unrest, revealed there had been threats to burn Pietermaritzburg hospitals as part of the protests.
Testifying during the last stretch of the hearing last week, Police Minister Bheki Cele said he received information on plans to burn down Pietermaritzburg hospitals during the week of civil unrest.
Cele said he had alerted the provincial commissioner about this threat. The minister added that police stations were also targeted because crowds thought they could easily be broken into.
“They were adamant on getting guns from the police station and threatened to kill police officials who resisted,” Cele said during the hearing.
“Big campaigns were created by crowds to delegitimise police officials and scare them off so that the process of mitigating the unrest would be slowed down,” Cele added.
He said he had even received a message that came across as a threat directed at the police. The message stated that if police officers who left Emlazi returned to the area, they would not find their wives and children.
Cele saw this as a clear indication that people were not protesting because something needed to be corrected. “They wanted to cause destruction instead,” he said. He reiterated the words of President Cyril Ramaphosa when he described the civil unrest as a “failed insurrection”.
He told SAHRC provincial manager, advocate Lloyd Lotz, that the attacks during the unrest were hybrid and focused on three things: targeted selection; extensive looting by people from informal settlements near malls and warehouses; and attacks on important interprovincial arterial roads.
Cele said he believed the attacks were planned, communicated and posted via social media platforms such as Twitter and open WhatsApp groups.
Social media posts called for the destruction of water systems, for the reservoir to be broken down and for the oil line from Durban to Johannesburg to be burst.
This, according to Cele, ultimately proved the situation had nothing to do with hunger or poverty but everything to do with people who wanted to forcefully and violently change the system.
During the hearing, Cele said that in the midst of the crisis, when there were indications of a possible massacre and the death of black people in the Indian community of Phoenix, he engaged directly with the people.
“Elements of criminality, racial issues and the abuse of the legitimate structure of private security companies were clear at the time, which then led to many more perpetrators being arrested,” Cele added.