A wary return to the community

THE last remaining temporary camp set up in Gauteng for foreigners displaced by xenophobic violence was shut down in Primrose, east of Johannesburg, yesterday.

About 50 people, mainly from Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi, returned to the communities from which they escaped last week.

Local community leaders reassured them they would be protected. But some foreigners were doubtful.

Mozambican Pedro Chauke, 30, who returned to Delport in Primrose yesterday, did not expect they would be safe.

“I’m staying because there is nothing else I can do,” he said, adding that if it was not for his job in Primrose he would consider returning to Mozambique.

Jordan Mahungani shared Chauke’s misgivings. “I’m going back there with my wife because I don’t have any other choice. Some of my friends left for Mozambique on Thursday.”

The Primrose camp was one of two set up by the Ekurhuleni municipality near Germiston last week after hundreds of foreigners fled the violence.

Sibaningi Ndlovu, 49, from Zimbabwe, was among those housed at the city’s other camp, at Elsburg, which was shut down on Thursday.

“I didn’t even have a chance to pack my stuff. I left everything back there, including my clothes,” said Ndlovu on Friday.

Ekurhuleni spokesman Zweli Dlamini said more than 1 000 people had sheltered at the two camps. Most had returned to their homes in Makause and Marathon informal settlements.

Dlamini said 120 people were transported back to Zimbabwe and Mozambique this week and three Malawians were collected by officials from their embassy.

But Ndlovu said leaving South Africa would mean “returning to poverty”.

“I have six children and a wife back home to feed. My business was doing well here,” he said. — Additional reporting by Pericles Anetos