Durban residents hid in their homes as a crowd burned a scrapyard and 19 were arrested

A crowd broke through an electric gate in Berea, searched a yard for foreign nationals, and then set a scrapyard on Moore Lane alight, according to residents who were at home when it happened on Friday afternoon.

Police in KwaZulu-Natal say 19 suspects were arrested after the unrest on Thursday and Friday, and that two houses and a scrapyard were burned in and around Durban. Several shops were damaged and some of them were looted, provincial police spokesperson Robert Netshiunda said. He said the majority of those arrested were students.

As IOL reported on 14 October, residents in Berea described fearing for their safety during the events. The Enquirer has spoken to the same record and sets out here what is established, what is still under investigation, and what the unrest is connected to.

A 50-year-old single mother of two on Moore Road said she had just come home from work when she heard shouting. She watched about ten men break her electric gate and come into her yard.

“I was scared. I didn’t know what to do. I thought they were going to burn the two vehicles on my property,” she said. She asked not to be named.

She said a neighbour came out and asked the group what they were doing, and was told they believed foreigners were hiding in the yard. The neighbour told them no one was there and they left. About 15 minutes later, she heard the commotion from the fire.

A 49-year-old resident a few doors from the scrapyard, who also asked not to be named, said the crowd gathered at the yard where foreign nationals wash and fix cars. His wife and two children were home with him.

“They came looking for foreign nationals. They found a few and assaulted them, then they set the scrapyard on fire,” he said.

He described explosions as the flames reached almost two storeys high, fed by petrol, oil and the plastic components of cars. The heat, he said, was intense enough that his windows were hot to the touch. With the smoke keeping the windows shut, the family evacuated and stood on the roadside for about an hour while firefighters brought the blaze under control. Both households said they now intend to increase security on their properties.

Netshiunda said intelligence officers and detectives are continuing to search for those responsible for the burning of cars and buildings.

The 19 accused appeared in the Durban Magistrate’s Court on Monday. The charges include public violence, malicious injury to property, incitement to commit public violence, and contravening the Regulation of Gatherings Act. That matter was adjourned to 16 October. Three of the accused also face charges of attempted murder, and their matter was adjourned to 19 October for bail consideration.

The unrest follows a Constitutional Court judgment in July on access to the asylum application process, and a subsequent Home Affairs directive that allowed undocumented foreign nationals to approach asylum reception offices to apply for asylum status. The department has since withdrawn that directive.

For readers in Durban, the practical questions are already local: what happens to the 19 accused when their cases return to court, whether the shops and homes damaged on Thursday and Friday are repaired or insured, and how the search for those not yet arrested proceeds. The scrapyard on Moore Lane was a place where foreign nationals worked on cars, which is why it was a target. The two households on Moore Road lost a gate, an evening and, they say, a measure of confidence in their own street.