FIRE LEAVES 289 HOMELESS

AT LEAST 289 families have been left homeless after a fire swept through the Joe Slovo informal settlement in Langa outside Cape Town on Tuesday evening. Forty fire-fighters battled for several hours to extinguish the blaze. Many of the stranded families were queuing at a nearby school on Wednesday to collect relief funds and other aid. Last week 71 homes were destroyed in a similar fire and some of the families who survived this blaze, saw their homes once again razed to the ground.