Police on high alert
LOCAL: FORCES DEPLOYED AFTER CHAOTIC PROTEST ACTION
Concerns of criminal elements planning looting sprees during demonstrations mount.
Police in Jeppestown, Johannesburg, were yesterday on alert following a violent protest on Sunday night by community members “fighting against drugs and prostitution” believed to be perpetrated by foreigners in the area.
This was the latest in a wave of xenophobic violence that had hit the province since several houses believed to be drug and prostitution dens were burnt down in Rosettenville.
Dozens of Johannesburg Metro Police Department and South African Police Service officers patrolled the still tense area from the early morning.
This was on the back of a Sunday night shoot-out between police and unknown assailants in the crowd.
During the patrol, dwellers of a nearby hostel heckled and shouted at police and the media, telling them to leave.
Remnants of the previous day’s chaos were hard to ignore, as evidenced by the aftermath of looting by alleged protesters and the damage to property incurred by businesses.
The violent protest was right on the heels of a visit on Sunday evening by Gauteng community safety MEC, Sizakele Nkosi-Malobane.
She was responding to reports of a group that had been allegedly threatening foreign nationals in the area.
Cameroonian-born resident Charles Ntui, 46, in South Africa for the past 19 years, found himself on the wrong side of the angry mob.
His premises were ransacked and looted.
Ntui believed the perpetrators were not protesters but an organised group of criminals who had planned the lootings.
“Those people ripped through my pre-school and did away with the items used for the children, including food stock and kitchen equipment, among others,” Ntui said.
“According to the community, they are trying to root out drugs and prostitution. But I don’t know if this building had anything to do with that.
“I’m reluctant to call what happened here xenophobia because there is definitely a criminal element, and the intelligence with the police is not there.”