Irate Pretoria West residents and surrounding community members marched to the their local police station to demand that all illegal foreigners in their area must pack and go.
They demand illegal foreigners must vacate buildings in Pretoria West.
“We are here to hand a memorandum of grievances and demands to the SAPS Pretoria West station commander as well as City of Tshwane Mayor’s office Dr Nasiphi Moya,” said President and founder of Concerned Tshwane Residents (CTR)civic movement Kagiso Kekana.
“We are here to actually vent our frustrations regarding illegal influx into our communities and illegal businesses in the Ptetoria West area because this is an area where one finds most foreigners from different countries gathered in one place, and it is therefore dangerous to our national security,” he lamented.
He stressed that the said foreigners are dangerous criminals who ran away from their countries.
He said brothels and human trafficking as well as illegal scrap yards are rife in Pretoria West and blamed this state of affairs on corrupt police officers who take bribes from foreigners.
“We also have a problem of child abuse and prostitution and there is lots of illegal things that are happening around this area,” he said.
“We want to reclaim all the buildings and houses that have been hijacked and turn them into student residential areas,” he said.
Ward 3 Councillor Malesela Rakabe also joined the protest march and said he agreed with the national call by CTR that says illegal immigrants must leave the country.
“Pretoria West is in a mess; we do daily operations here with the Executive Mayor Dr Nasiphi Moya and it has emerged that there are illegally erected shacks and people living therein are stealing the electricity and water of the City of Tshwane Municipality and there are scrapyards all over the place which are owned by illegal immigrants,” explained Rakabe.
“We share the same sentiments with our local residents and we are not xenophobic but what we are saying is that all the lawlessness taking place here in Pretoria West must be stopped,” he said.
He emphasised that the local Pretoria West Police station officers must exercise their Constitutional mandate and get rid of all the illegal scrapyards in the area including all illegal activities.
Ward 3 SANCO chairperson Vuyo Langa said he and members of the organisation attended the protest march to support the demands of the residents and also to make sure that the march pruceeds peacefully.
Pretoria West SAPS station commander Brigadier Margaret Nkwane told the protestors that she will sit down with management and discuss their demand.
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