Community members from the Manenberg Safety Forum (MSF) held an urgent public meeting at the Green Pastures Church on Saturday after three people were shot in suspected gang related shootings over the weekend. The shootings came just a day after Operation Fiela targeted homes in the area on Thursday.

A visibly distraught Rugshanda Pascoe, the chairperson of the Forum, said she and her family slept in one, humble bedroom as shootings broke out on their doorstep in Kathleen Court.

The forum has called on South Africans to join them as they file a case of genocide against the Constitutional Court on behalf of the people in the country. According to Pascoe, these efforts come as their call for government’s immediate intervention is not being heard.

“We as people in communities like Manenberg encounters violence in different ways every second of the day. We can no longer negotiate with government. Government is supposed to move at the call of the people,” Pascoe stated.

Pascoe says the violent conditions in Manenberg is something she has grown up in and fears her grandchildren won’t live to see their next birthday at the current rate of gang violence and lack of support from the army.

“Police only managed to get three guns from their Operation Fiela. That is a joke. They failed to recognise the efforts of the people on the ground and allow us to guide the process of eradicating gang activity from the area. Since the operation, gun shoot outs between rival gangs has only worsened,” Pascoe continued.

“We want the army to help us, work with us and not contain the situation. We are still waiting for news that those three people are still alive. Every second people are losing their lives in Manenberg, Hanover Park, Bontheuwel, Mitchells Plain. Parents are losing their children. How long can we sit still and let this happen. Since the apartheid, gang violence is still the order of the day in Manenberg,” Pascoe explained. VOC (Ra’eesah Isaacs)