The fire highlighted a problem that authorities have failed to tackle: Johannesburg's city center is so abandoned by business and the state that gangs and extortionists are filling the void.
Fire in downtown block killed more than 70 people this weekJOHANNESBURG, Sept 2 - Like many impoverished residents of downtown Johannesburg, Sihle Dube had rented a tiny room from someone who didn't actually own it, in a rundown building that was becoming a trash-strewn haven for drugs and crime.
Many have become dilapidated centres of drug trafficking and other lawlessness. Fires sometimes break out because residents rely on illegal electricity connections, gas burners and candles. Spokespeople for the City of Johannesburg and police did not respond to requests for comment about the residents' accounts. But Johannesburg city manager Floyd Brink said there was a plan to get hijacked buildings back under control. He did not provide details, saying it needed council approval.on Saturday. "Our cities and municipalities must now pay attention to how people live."The building was a relic of South Africa's apartheid past.
Sihle Dube, a survivour of a deadly fire in Johannesburg, is admitted at Bertha Gxowa Hospital in Germiston, South Africa, September 1, 2023. REUTERS/Thando HlopheThey'd both become used to living in over-crowded buildings populated by dubious characters claiming rent for their "property", they said. In one place Jack stayed, a different man knocked on her door every month-end for his 400 rand .
But since the charity stopped using it, he said, the building had become a target for rent-seeking syndicates.
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At least 73 dead in Johannesburg building fire, authorities sayDozens of people were killed in a fire that engulfed a five-story building in central Johannesburg early Thursday, authorities said.
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At least 73 dead in Johannesburg building fire, authorities sayDozens of people were killed in a fire that engulfed a five-story building in central Johannesburg early Thursday, authorities said.
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At least 73 dead in Johannesburg building fire, authorities sayDozens of people were killed in a fire that engulfed a five-story building in central Johannesburg early Thursday, authorities said.
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