Tension between foreign nationals at Blue Water displacement camp

By Ilhaam Hoosain
22 June 2008

At the Blue Water displacement camp violence has erupted between two nationalities namely Zimbabweans and Congolese foreign nationals.

“Well there has been tension between the Congolese group and the Zimbabwean group. There is a claim among the Congolese that the Zimbabwean group is playing loud music, smoking dagga and playing soccer near where they are staying disrupting their families.

“We have sent in a mediating team to calm tension there and to talk to the people and get them to reach an agreement so that they don’t come into conflict with each other,” says city spokesperson Robert Macdonald.

There are currently only about 200 people staying at the camp with accommodation space for up to 2000 people.

According to Macdonald the incident was sparked when one of the soccer players from the Zimbabwean group broke a window in one of the places where the Congolese group was staying and it resulted in a minor confrontation.

He says that there was no serious incident and there were metro police on the scene to calm the situation.

More people for Blue Water

“We are going to be moving more people into Blue Waters but we going to be moving them to a separate section, it is actually a very large sight.

“We are going to spread the people out a bit so that they do not get in each others way,” says Macdonald.

He adds that they have a mediating team in place as well as metro police to prevent any incidents.