Firefighters attend to a fire, 15 September 2023, at an abandoned building in Johannesburg. The fire broke out on the ground floor of the three story building, just two blocks away from the scene of another fire that killed 77 people earlier this month. Everyone who was in the building was evacuated to safety and no casualties were reported. Picture: Michel Bega/The Citizen
Prevention is better than cure, it is said, yet Johannesburg has seen a devastating trend of fire outbreaks over the last few weeks.
From the Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital fire in 2021 which led to closure of the facility for many months, to Wednesday’s fire incident at the SA Revenue Service building in the Joburg CBD, horrific fires seemingly reflect the lack of maintenance of civil and local government properties.
In June, a fire broke out in the Florence Nightingale building in Hillbrow, which claimed the lives of two children who had been locked in a flat.
Last month, a fire at the Usindiso building in Joburg left 77 people dead and many injured. Just last week, another fire broke out two blocks away from the Usindiso Building.
The fire started out on the ground floor of a three-storey building in which residents had set up shacks in the building suspected to have been hijacked.
A commission of inquiry into what caused the Joburg CBD fire has since been established by Gauteng premier Panyaza Lesufi.
City of Joburg Emergency Management Services (EMS) spokesperson Robert Mulaudzi said the EMS unit conducted building inspections regularly.
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He said they would check, in terms of the fire service bylaws, whether buildings were compliant or not, and would provide recommendations if there was a need for a building to be closed or evacuated.
“We only focus on the fire safety component of the inspection. That is our jurisdiction. There are other departments, like building compliance. We just form part of the team,” he said.
“We do have records which we can provide to say … how many and which buildings we have inspected from last year up to now.”
Political analyst Goodenough Mashego said the fires in Joburg were a result of lack of governance, and the fact that there was no political stability in the city made it difficult for senior public servants to do their jobs.
“When it comes to management of all these assets, inspection of buildings, installation of meters, collection of revenue, functioning of JMPD (Johannesburg Metro Police Department), City Parks, Rand Water and Johannesburg Water, those are functions done by municipal officials,” said Mashego.
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“But given the fact that coalitions are done with horse-trading for positions in the public service, it is not easy for people to do their job. The buildings often catch fire because somebody is [passing the buck].
“I also think it is political. It could be done to discredit mayor Kabelo Gwamanda or the coalition governance, so the whole administration collapses and they can start another horse-trading.”
Mashego claimed there was lack of inspection and also high corruption in the inspectorate itself. “These buildings are there. Everybody knows them,” he said.
“When people who are supposed to go there to inspect them are given money, they are not going to come up with a report which says the building must be closed down.”
The Joburg EMS proactive directorate notes on its page on the city’s website that Joburg’s rapid expansion has led to an increase in the number of fire-related emergencies “because of poor adherence to fire safety precautions and fire code applications by the building industry”.
READ: Two Eastern Cape families die in shack fires
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