CT camp closure delayed

2008-10-08 20:27

Cape Town - Authorities have agreed to hold back on the closure of camps still housing foreigners in Cape Town, the Aids Law Project said on Wednesday.

ALP attorney Fatima Hassan said the Harmony Park camp, which holds some 800 people, was to have been closed on Friday.

The ALP, other civil society organisations, and camp leaders had met Western Cape provincial government officials on Tuesday.

Hassan said her understanding of the outcome of the meeting was that the province had consented to hold over the Harmony Park closure until at least next Friday, when the Youngsfield camp was also scheduled to be shut.

The postponement would allow for accelerated efforts to reintegrate or repatriate the Harmony Park residents.

The province had also agreed to keep the Blue Waters camp open until all remaining refugees had been either reintegrated or repatriated.

Her understanding was that refugees still in the first two camps when they closed would be free to move to Blue Waters.

She said the leaders of the refugees wanted the camps closed because conditions there were intolerable, and they wanted to get on with their lives.

However they were determined that the last camp should not close until all refugees were reintegrated, resettled or repatriated.

- SAPA