City of Cape Town Law Enforcement officers on Monday arrested three people as they clashed with foreign nationals recently evicted from Greenmarket Square in the CBD where they’d been squatting for five months.
A nine-month pregnant woman was also taken away in an ambulance as the refugees tried to set up camp in a park in Roeland Street in the vicinity of the Cape Peninsula of Technology.
The City is acting on an order of the Western Cape High Court that does not allow the foreigners to live, sleep, cook and wash in
public spaces.
The City said it could not give the refugees homes as it would set a bad precedent and urged them to return to the areas they lived prior to moving to Greenmarket Square.
But the foreign nationals have refused and said they would rather go to jail than live in fear among “xenophobic” South Africans.
“We want to be arrested, send us to Pollsmoor,” cried Michael Muntukole, a Congolese national who was being removed from the park yesterday.
Picture: Velani Ludidi
“If they cannot deport us, then arrest us. We asked to be sent to Canada as asylum seekers and the government refused,” he said as officers formed a line preparing to remove foreign nationals.
A woman was heard screaming after she lost sight of her child during the chaos.
She cursed the officials, saying: “You will never be happy again in your lives and God will punish you for doing this to us.”
Traffic was also affected in District Six as the emotional refugees ran into the road, begging motorists “to run them over”.
Picture: Velani Ludidi
The City’s executive director for Safety and Security, Richard Bosman confirmed three males, aged 17, 38 and 41, were arrested and charged with assault of a police officer, contravening a court order and resisting arrest.