Turmoil as Red Ants evict residents at flats
The Red Ants have been removing furnitures and belongings from three Municipal owned apartments, Pharoe Park, Airport Park and Delville Park in Germiston. Due to unpaid rent the Magistrate has given the municipality the go ahead for ivictions. This however created a tension betwee residence and the Red Ants. Picture: Mujahid Safodien 04 08 2011 The Red Ants have been removing furnitures and belongings from three Municipal owned apartments, Pharoe Park, Airport Park and Delville Park in Germiston. Due to unpaid rent the Magistrate has given the municipality the go ahead for ivictions. This however created a tension betwee residence and the Red Ants. Picture: Mujahid Safodien 04 08 2011
SHAIN GERMANER
MASS evictions at three Germiston flat complexes turned ugly yesterday as security specialists, the Red Ants, faced hundreds of angry residents.
The raids began after a solution to a three-year rent battle between the municipality and the residents of Pharoe Park, Airport Park and Delville Park was delayed yet again on Wednesday.
Dozens of Red Ants security guards arrived at the corner of Jack and Queen streets in Germiston in the early hours of the morning.
Residents reported violent confrontations with the Red Ants, rubber bullets being fired, and beatings from several security guards as they tried to prevent them from taking their clothes, appliances and furniture from their homes.
Cindy Dayimani showed The Star a wound on her leg she said had been inflicted by a rubber bullet after she had tried to convince a security guard to allow her to take her possessions outside.
“He called me a prostitute and I got angry and shouted at him, so he shot me,” said Dayimani.
The police arrived at about 9am. A brawl then broke out between a line of police officers and a small group of protesting residents that resulted in the arrest of one man for public violence.
The street outside the three complexes was littered with huge piles of possessions that had been removed from the more than 100 homes raided by the Red Ants.
Members of the Pharoe, Airport and Delville Residents’ Association (Padra) were convinced that their homes were considered RDP housing by the municipality, but according to the member of the mayoral committee for human settlements, Queen Duba, this was not the case.
Yesterday afternoon, Padra’s lawyer, Tshikomelo Ramoba, told The Star that an urgent application had been filed at the high court to prevent the evictions.