STATEMENT BY BRETT HERRON, GOOD SECRETARY-GENERAL AND MEMBER OF THE WESTERN CAPE PROVINCIAL PARLIAMENT
6 APRIL 2020
CITY DUMPS HOMELESS PEOPLE IN STRANDFONTEIN
Despite concerns from Strandfontein residents and organisations working with street people about the suitability of the site, the City of Cape Town has acted to round up homeless people from suburbs across Cape Town and dump them in giant tents on a remote sports field in Strandfontein – in conditions that can only be described as a concentration camp. This, “to protect them from coronavirus”.
By the time the first group of the city’s homeless detainees arrived at the heavily guarded sports ground, autumn rain had already reduced the area to a muddy cess-pit.
Henry Pietersen was forced onto a bus in Sea Point, where he has lived on the streets for 30 years. He carried a small bag of belongings he managed to grab before being “removed”. He is originally from Ashton, and pleaded with GOOD Secretary-General Brett Herron to help him go back to his family in Ashton rather than be held at this remote, cold and wet homeless people camp.
Those street people with pets were forced to abandon them. In Bothasig community activists are trying to round up pets and find homes for them.
According to a law enforcement officer at the site, 2000 people were brought in on Day One of the operation. Some had already left through the fence, he said.
The DA-led city government is making a big mistake treating homeless people in this way. Its policies are old-fashioned, anti-poor and doomed to fail.