Hundreds of Capetonians face 2006 homeless following fires in the Masiphumelele neighbourhood in the South Peninsula last week.
Among them, undoubtedly, are schoolchildren who may now enter their new classes without uniforms, books and possibly without even school fees, let alone somewhere to study and sleep and eat. And it’s very likely that among the homeless are the very children and teenagers who told University of Cape Town (UCT) researchers that fire was one of their worst nightmares.
”Worrying about fires is one of the main issues highlighted by children and teenagers in our study in 2005,” says Dr Rachel Bray, of the Centre for Social Science Research at UCT. ”They know that people die. And they know that services find it difficult to come in time because the nearest fire station is in Fish Hoek, several kilometres down the road.”
Bray, working with researchers Susan Moses and Imke Gooskens, spent a year-and-a-half of what she calls ”serious human investment” in getting to know a wide range of children — about 70 overall — in the often-overlooked South Peninsula region of Cape Town.
”The children didn’t complain so much about the lack of facilities like poor housing or leaking roofs, which we had expected, or sanitation or water shortages,” the research coordinator reports. ”But they were very concerned about fire.”
Although the fear is most pronounced in children living in informal settlements, their peers in better-off suburbs in the South Peninsula are also highly aware of the dangers, and empathise with the difficulties of living densely packed together in shacks.
Firefighters, obviously, aren’t able to consult with children first before doing what they can to contain the fires that burned out of control in much of the Cape this windswept holiday season. But other adults may be in a different position.
”Children in the new South Africa are asking for more consultation about what is being done for them,” confirms Bray. But this is not about high-handed prima donnas demanding more from cash-strapped government departments or charities, she cautions.
”Children realise that someone like a firefighter can only do so much. The firefighters come into the schools to educate them. They know about getting down low and crawling out and not making an effort to rescue their possessions,” says Bray. The issue, for her, is what happens in the aftermath of a fire.
Survivors are often very grateful for clothes and any offers of help in an emergency. But Bray suggests that fires raise long-term issues that also need to be tackled.
”There’s a very real connection between fires and problems with schooling, for example,” she notes.
Also, preventative efforts are often more effective if they consult the entire community, including the children.
”Services that consult with children and teens are much more effective in achieving their aims,” the Scarborough resident explains.
Young people are clear on what works for them: not disapproving staff in distant locations, but officials and services easily available within walking distance.
Even limited interventions are deeply appreciated by the children — and have unexpected and beneficial spin-offs. Feeding schemes in Ocean View and Masiphumelele, for example, nourish both body and soul as the local women who cook for the children also keep an eye on them, assisting personally when their families are torn apart in a crisis or alerting social workers.
Most of all, school was identified as a hugely important space for children, whether to recover from the trauma of a fire or to socialise with others from different residential areas.
Although the children see apartheid as something old-fashioned and out of date — ”our parent’s generation, not ours” — researchers noted otherwise. They said the lingering, toxic aftereffects of apartheid still have a huge daily impact on the lives of young people, more than a decade after the official disappearance of legal segregation.
The physical location of communities, continuing disparities in financial resources and the circulation of stereotypes damage many children’s chances of accessing facilities and hampered meaningful interaction across social and physical boundaries.
Runaway fires, after all, may gut two homes in Camps Bay over the holiday season. But the fires will burn down 100 shacks in Masiphumelele in the same space of time.
It’s not because the wind blows differently. It’s because of poverty. And the children and teenagers know it.
”Children in Ocean View and Masiphumelele are acutely aware of the economic factors that underlie the violence that surrounds them, whether it’s fires or fights outside a shebeen,” says Bray. ”They understand that there is a limit to what can be done. But they’re saying that any attempt to improve the situation has to take the poverty into account.”
Research done by Rachel Bray and her team is available online on the Centre for Social Science Research website at UCT