School eviction sparks spiral of 'utter destruction' in Cape Town suburb

A community hall and a bus are the latest targets of violence after residents of a Cape Town suburb were evicted from an illegal school.

Protesters in Joe Slovo Park‚ near Milnerton‚ torched the community centre on Monday night‚ a day after upgrades to the building were completed.

Trouble started when the sheriff of the high court evicted community members who had opened a makeshift primary school using Western Cape Education Department mobile classrooms.

Community leader Masixhole Bobe said the residents occupied the classrooms‚ which were on vacant land belonging to the City of Cape Town‚ and were angry they had been removed.

Several people were arrested in the protests over the weekend and a MyCiTi bus was torched. Residents demanding the release of the arrested community members torched the newly refurbished community hall.

Education Department spokeswoman Jessica Shelver said the mobile classrooms were set up to accommodate pupils from Sinenjongo High School‚ which was rebuilt last year at a cost of R47-million.

In February‚ with the education department's lease on city council land having expired‚ residents occupied the classrooms and opened an “illegal” primary school with no official teachers.

They were evicted on June 7 after they department obtained a high court interdict against the occupiers.

City of Cape Town mayoral committee member for safety and security JP Smith said the damage to the community centre could amount to R2-million.

“This is particularly hard to swallow when just yesterday the Department of Recreation and Parks finished extensive repairs to all ceiling boards and doors in this facility after years of motivating for the funding‚” he said.

“No room within this facility was spared in this act of violence. The main hall and kitchen have both sustained substantial fire damage. Even the storeroom of the facility was burnt down‚ along with all of the recreation equipment stored within it.”

Recreation and parks area head Sarel van Deventer said staff had spent years transforming the hall into one of Cape Town’s best recreation hubs.

“After hearing the news‚ it was difficult for me to motivate myself to get out of bed to face going to see the utter destruction‚” he said. “Just last week this hall was humming with children at a series of Youth Day programmes and we had weeks of holiday programmes planned for winter. Now I have had to remove my staff from the facility.

“I can’t describe how discouraging this is for us as recreation staff.”Source: TMG Digital.