Refugees back to camp in front of the UN building in Pretoria

More than 30 refugee families from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) set up camp in front of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHRC) building in Brooklyn, Pretoria, after being forcefully removed in 2019.

While women prepared food on an open fire on the pavement, children played in boxes inside the shelters, constructed out of plastic and cardboard boxes.

Elvis Ntamba Diasonama, one of the refugees living on the pavement, said he was left paralysed after an accident that has left him wheelchair-bound.

“I just come here now and I’ve been sleeping here for two weeks.

I originally came from the DRC and went to Cape Town in 2004,” he said. He didn’t want to elaborate on how he ended up in Pretoria.

“It is a very long story.”

Ntamba Diasonama said because he couldn’t use his legs, he slept in his wheelchair. He had been battling for seven years to get help from a hospital.

“They turned me away because I am a foreigner. That is why I came here to ask them to send me to another country where I can get help.

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“Here, I don’t have food and I don’t have a place to sleep,” he said.

Ntamba Diasonama said he wasn’t safe roaming the streets because thugs targeted and robbed him. A female refugee from DRC, who didn’t want to be named, said they were sent to Lindela Repatriation Centre in Krugersdorp in 2019, only to be brought back by the same people.

She said they fled to the UNHRC for refuge, following violent xenophobia attacks in 2019.

“On 10 May, they brought us back. In 2019, we lived on the street for 40 days until the police came to take us.”

The refugee said the conditions in Lindela, a centre of detention for undocumented foreigners, were worse than outside.

“We suffered there and we are now traumatised.”

She said the group asked the UNHRC for help, who suggested volunteering to go back to Lindela.

“I can’t go back home, it’s worse there than here. But here there are too many problems. We don’t want to be here any more,” she said.

The refugee said they now had to beg for food and sleep outside in the cold. “Even if they send me to Ukraine, no problem, I just don’t want to be here,” she said.

There were currently 34 families with 36 children camping on the pavement. UNHRC spokesperson Laura Padoan said they were concerned about the refugees camping.

“It’s far from ideal circumstances to be living in. The group of about 100 people arrived two weeks ago and are here now because they are asking for asylum in other countries.”

Padoan said asylum was not available for a group and was only granted to very vulnerable individuals.

“The places for asylum were limited and the number of refugees around the world far outstretched the number of refugee places available,” she said.

She said UNHRC offered the refugees material assistance and offered to counsel them about their options. “It’s either voluntary repatriation or local integration,” she said.

Padoan said the situation wasn’t ideal for anybody