Residents of Site B in Khayelitsha say they have been unfairly treated after law enforcement officials destroyed their shacks on Tuesday.
The residents said they had been using the dwellings to make a living and that their livelihoods had now been taken away from them.
The Specialised Enforcement Services chief officer for the city of Cape Town, Rudolf Wiltshire, confirmed that 30 shacks had been destroyed across Khayelitsha.
Resident Nontombizakhe Ntabeni, who cooks and sells sheep heads, said she had just started building her shack when law enforcement officials came and "destroyed it like a piece of trash", without explaining why.
"The community asked me to move to that site because the smoke where I used to sell was affecting them," she said.
Ntabeni said she was unemployed with six children and was now worried about how she was going to earn a living.
"I don't know what else to do now because this is the second time this has happened to me.
"When I first built my shack there, the governing body of the area told me I couldn't just put it there and I had to go through a process," said Ntabeni.
Law enforcement officers at the scene on Tuesday, who refused to give their names, said the shacks posed a threat to the community.
This was confirmed by Wiltshire, who said the shacks had posed a threat because they were on the pavement, forcing people to walk in the road.
He said the operation had been arranged by law enforcement and the housing department after they received threats of land invasion.
They had "destroyed shacks that were not occupied by people because we had a right to do so", he said. - Cape Argus
The residents said they had been using the dwellings to make a living and that their livelihoods had now been taken away from them.
The Specialised Enforcement Services chief officer for the city of Cape Town, Rudolf Wiltshire, confirmed that 30 shacks had been destroyed across Khayelitsha.
Resident Nontombizakhe Ntabeni, who cooks and sells sheep heads, said she had just started building her shack when law enforcement officials came and "destroyed it like a piece of trash", without explaining why.
"The community asked me to move to that site because the smoke where I used to sell was affecting them," she said.
Ntabeni said she was unemployed with six children and was now worried about how she was going to earn a living.
"I don't know what else to do now because this is the second time this has happened to me.
"When I first built my shack there, the governing body of the area told me I couldn't just put it there and I had to go through a process," said Ntabeni.
Law enforcement officers at the scene on Tuesday, who refused to give their names, said the shacks posed a threat to the community.
This was confirmed by Wiltshire, who said the shacks had posed a threat because they were on the pavement, forcing people to walk in the road.
He said the operation had been arranged by law enforcement and the housing department after they received threats of land invasion.
They had "destroyed shacks that were not occupied by people because we had a right to do so", he said. - Cape Argus
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