Human Rights - Mob attacked Ethiopian refugees in South Africa

Mob attacked Ethiopian refugees in South Africa

9 February, 2010 | IRIN

JOHANNESBURG, Foreign

nationals are being attacked

with "impunity" in South

Africa, a leading human rights

organization charged as the

latest service delivery protests

turned violent and several

hundred residents turned their

anger on Ethiopian refugees

living in Siyathemba township,

about 80km east of Johannesburg.

Service delivery protests erupted on 7 February in Siyathemba, a satellite
township of Balfour, a rural town in Mpumalanga Province. Shops
owned by foreign nationals were looted, more than 100 people, including
women and children fled the township, and police arrested 22 people for
public violence, according to reports.

Similar acts of xenophobia took place during service delivery protests
eight months ago in the same township, when the perpetrators were also
arrested but charges of public violence were subsequently dropped.

"Many of those affected by the violence ... were also victims of violence
in July 2009, where the shops of foreign nationals were targeted
following service delivery protests and around 100 people were
displaced. Those who laid criminal charges relating to the violence and
the damages were later intimidated into dropping these," the Consortium
for Refugees and Migrants in Southern Africa (CORMSA), said in a
statement.

Amnesty International, a global rights watchdog, said in a statement:
"There remains a culture of impunity for crimes against refugees and
migrants [in South Africa]. There persists also low public awareness of
the country's human rights obligations towards refugees and others in
need of international protection."

Service delivery protests have become frequent in the post-apartheid era,
and although most are peaceful demonstrations demanding that
government fulfil their commitments to improve the lives of the majority,
some spill over into violence and more often than not result in
xenophobic violence.

Duncan Breen, CORMSA's advocacy officer, told IRIN that "issues of
governance" often fuelled community frustrations, which could lead to
outbreaks of xenophobic violence.

He said civil society and the police were developing early warning
systems to provide an intelligence network of possible xenophobic
outbreaks and/or violence, and government was establishing a national
action plan to protect vulnerable people against xenophobia, which would
fall under the aegis of the justice department.

Broken promises

In August 2009, President Jacob Zuma and a host of ministers
descended unannounced on Balfour and Siyathemba in the aftermath of
the violent service delivery protests and deplored the xenophobic
violence, which was seen as a commitment by Zuma and his new
government to provide service delivery in disadvantaged communities.

"Places like Balfour, which seem to be very remote - that's the places I'm
going to be going to, unannounced, all the time, to get to know what are
the problems, why didn't we deliver certain things," Zuma said during his
visit.

"The ministers, together with the provincial and local leadership, agreed
on short-, medium- and long-term interventions, which should begin to
address challenges and concerns of communities," said a statement
issued by his office after the visit.

The presidency undertook to alleviate poverty, support community
projects, generate employment, build 100 homes "within the current
financial year [which ends on 28 Feb 2010]" and improve transport
infrastructure, among other things.

Tebogo Moagi, a member of the community steering committee and an
organizer of the service delivery protest, told local media that the
presidency's promises were empty.

The committee has demanded that Zuma return to the township to
explain the government's inaction. "Since the protest [in July 2009]
nothing has happened. We have had no response from the municipality,"
Moagi said.

Zuma is unlikely to accede to their demands; he is currently in Cape
Town preparing for the opening of parliament on 11 February - which
will also mark the 20th anniversary of Nelson Mandela's release from jail
- and has maintained a low profile since it emerged 10 days ago that he
had fathered a daughter out of wedlock, now four months old.

In the first six weeks of 2010 foreigners were also attacked in
Atteridgeville near Pretoria, Riviersonderend in the Western Cape, and
Polokwane in Limpopo Province. Xenophobic violence erupted
throughout South Africa in 2008, killing at least 62 people and displacing
100,000 others.