New start for fire victims

The Davids family huddles together in their shared space at the community hall in Hangberg, speaking about their day at school, from left Jenne-lee, Alderno, Aldereeno and Arcadia.

Victims of the Hangberg fire which left about 80 people homeless in October last year, have been promised new homes, running water and work opportunities.

The blaze also claimed the lives of two people; Daniel Williams, 46, and 15-year-old Veron Fredericks, 15.

Last Thursday, the City of Cape Town Mayor Dan Plato, and Hout Bay ward councillor Roberto Quintas, met with fire victims at the community hall where some families are still living, to discuss the next phase in building their new homes.

Alderno Davids, 34, who lost everything in the fire and subsequently his job, said the meeting had a positive message.

“The mayor came and gave us an explanation on the ground he was going to give us and he would come back to us with the way forward in 10 days. He said they will get us new ground because the grounds we previously lived on is unstable… everybody is okay with it and we agreed to the 10 days,” said Mr Davids.

“They promised to sort us out with everything in our new homes. We’ll get running water, electricity, toilets, everything will be sorted,” he said.

Mr Davids, his wife and three children aged 6, 9 and 11, share an open space in the community hall with four other families. 

A week after losing his home, Mr Davids lost his job a week later as well.

“I’m still unemployed. I was doing ventilation work but lost my job because I missed work a lot. I had just lost my home, things were tough and I was helping to sort things out at home,” he said.

“I had no money to travel to work. I worked in Montague Gardens and would usually take a taxi to the city and from there make my way to Montague Gardens. We have had lots of help from the community and the City with food, clothes and mattresses to sleep on.”

Mr Quintas said he was grateful for the patience the community had shown so far despite the delay in rebuilding their homes.

He added that the fire victims felt the slope their homes had been built on was dangerous and unsafe to return to and that’s what caused the initial delay.

“We then had our informal settlements engineers go out on site to do an investigation on the affected site and they concluded that it was a risk.

“We then had to find an alternative site and it was in November but there seemed to be a division in the community of the fire victims as half or more were willing to move to a new site within the area because they wanted things to get moving quickly,” said Mr Quintas.

“We made the fire victims aware that we’ve identified four possible locations and it will be in the area. We won’t relocate anyone to a different area because we want to keep them close to their schools, their families, churches groups and mosques,” he said.

“We are also aware that families are under a lot of strain so we are hoping to try and provide work opportunities to the unemployed. There will be opportunities for them to help us level the site and we will erect the site ourselves as the City of Cape Town and help everyone relocate,” Mr Quintas added.

“We made the fire victims aware that we’ve identified four possible locations and it will be in the area. We won’t relocate anyone to a different area because we want to keep them close to their schools, their families, churches groups and mosques,” he said.

Meanwhile, some have rebuilt their homes on the same unsafe mountain slope, others moved in with families with five families still living at the community hall.