Xenophobic sentiments, cloud blotting SA’s image
ALEXANDRA – Bodies found in Alex after SA's image denting lootings, xeno sentiments.
Two unidentified charred bodies were found in Alex, raising to seven the number of reported deaths to date from the sporadic looting and carnage in Gauteng Province.
The victims are said to be both locals and foreign nationals.
The bodies, with one, said to be headless and found by scrap metal collectors, were in a burnt shop along 1st Avenue a day after the mayhem said to run into millions of rands in losses to business operators and street traders. Provincial police spokesperson, Captain Kay Makhubela said the shop owners allowed to access their wreckage if they thought they could salvage anything didn’t report anything untoward.
This also pending the police’s thorough investigation of malicious damage to property. Eight people are said to have been arrested in Alex, some in the shops, adding to several in other areas.
Premier David Makhura, who described the incidents as acts of criminality and suggested the army may be called in if necessary, had to scramble around with security cluster agencies calling for calm. Provincial Police Commissioner Lieutenant General Elias Mawela said they were on the tail of the ring leaders inciting the looting by exploiting xenophobic sentiments which flare up occasionally. This said as some local businesses were among foreign-owned ones affected.
Also, President Cyril Ramaphosa waded in, appealing for calm during the World Economic Forum on Africa meeting in Cape Town. “We embrace anyone bringing in critical skills,” he said referring to legislation enabling entry of foreign nationals with scare professions required for national economic development.
The appeals for calm coincides with foreign nationals and their governments describing the incidents as xenophobic and seemingly without concrete solution from previous ones.
This time some associated the looting with local citizens reacting to the recent retreat in the Joburg Central Business district by the police who were pelted with stones by foreign nationals trading in shops and streets and in Pretoria where a taxi driver was shot dead allegedly by a foreign national in relation to drug dealing.
The traders claimed harassment by the police they alleged also solicited for bribes. The police though, say they carry out regular patrols to enforce by-laws and news coverage showed them retrieving counterfeit goods said to be smuggled into the country, impacting genuine products and harming the economy.
Meanwhile, the Nigeria government summoned the South African ambassador to register their complaints on the incidents. They said a team would be dispatched for discussion with the South African government. Also, a friendly international soccer match in Lusaka between South Africa and Zambia this weekend was cancelled by that country’s sports authorities. This as locals in both Nigeria and Zambia also reacted to the incidents by looting from branches of some South African companies while others closed operations as a precautionary measure.
The head of the ambassador’s forum and DRC Ambassador Bene M’poko appealed for restraint and consultative approach with the South African government as it resolves the incidents which some fear may lead to a fall-out with some countries if no concrete solutions to the attacks are found.
This drawing from past incidents when horrific scenes were beamed globally in 2015 of a Zimbabwean national who was burnt alive in the presence of children and in 2017, of Mozambican Emmanuel Sithole who was butchered in Alexandra by three youths and a 17-year-old near the current site of the looting. Two of them, Mthinta Bhengu and Sifundo Mzimela, were found guilty by the Joburg Magistrates’ Court and sentenced to 17 years’ and 10 years’ imprisonment, respectively.
Bhengu who had a previous criminal record was ruled as a danger to society. The teenager was sent for juvenile rehabilitation and the fourth was acquitted. The four had refused to pay for cigarettes from Sithole, a street vendor, and chased after him when he demanded payment, resulting in Bhengu stabbing him while others hit him with metal objects.
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