The growing number of brutal attacks on the Somali community in the Western Cape has forced the local police to admit that xenophobia, and not criminality, is the main motivating factor in the attacks.
In the most recent incidents, two Somali businessmen with shops in Delft and Kuilsriver were killed, while one Somali trader was shot and injured in Khayelitsha last weekend in Paarl and another killed this week. According to members of the Somali community, this brings the total number of those killed to 40 in the last three months. The police are disputing this number, saying that they are only aware of the deaths of 20 Somalis in the past 10 months.
”We are being singled out and we are being shot and killed and the authorities do not believe us when we say that we are terrified and that there is a deliberate campaign to drive us out of the townships,” said a 40-year-old Somali businessman with a shop in Khayelitsha. ”You can’t publish my name because maybe I’ll be shot and killed next.”
Authorities in the Western Cape have responded bizarrely to the obvious targeting and killing of Somalis in townships around Cape Town, with the police persistently saying that there is no evidence that the attacks on the Somalis are anything but criminal. Even documented cases in which Somalis were shot and killed but not robbed are being regarded as criminal. The Mail & Guardian is aware of at least six Somalis who were shot and killed, but not robbed.
”We have arrested and charged nine people for the 20 murders of the Somalian shop owners/keepers. These cases are investigated as purely criminal cases as these cases appear to be economically motivated,” South African Police Service media spokesperson Superintendent Billy Jones said this week.
Since the middle of August, the Somalis have been saying that they have been singled out because they’re successful businessmen and locals in the townships regard them as an economic threat. Yet it was only after a group of South African businessmen, taxi owners and landlords looted, torched and broke down 14 Somali-owned shops in Masiphumelele, the township outside Kommetjie, last month that Premier Ebrahim Rasool ordered Leonard Ramatlakane, the Western Cape Minister for Community Safety, to investigate whether South African businessmen were behind the attacks. Ramatlakane has since then said that these attacks do show ”some xenophobic tendencies”.
Ramatlakane’s spokesperson, Makhaya Mani, admitted that the provinical minister is ”very concerned about xenophobia when it comes to the attacks on the Somalis. The one problem is that the locals don’t want to live with the Som2§alis and we don’t know why … These people have a place here in the Western Cape as well. We’re working to persuade the locals, but it’s a long process.”
The majority of the Somalis who lost their property and possessions in Masiphumelele have not returned to this township because they’re too scared. ”The black people in this country treat us like dogs. What’s the point of living here and making a living, but you’re too scared to walk the streets?” asked a Somali who didn’t want to be named.
Two streets away a South African businessmen confirmed that there is an organised campaign led by local businessmen to drive the Somalis out of the townships. ”The night when we attacked the Somalis here in Masiphumelele, a whole group of businessmen had a meeting. At this meeting we discussed how the Somalis undercut us. They sell their products cheaper than us. They’re not scared to loan money to the locals. Naturally the locals support them rather than us, which makes the businessmen very angry. The Somalis also go and buy their products in the city and bring it here. So now the locals don’t have to take the taxis to go to town. So the taxi drivers are also angry with the Somalis.
”Most businessmen here feel cheated by the Somalis because these foreigners come here and they take our customers and our business and it’s unfair. There is not enough space and money for all of us. We were here first. Our people are simply scared that they will lose the little they have. The Somalis must go,” said the businessman, who only wanted to be called Dumesani.