The Nigerian Mission in South
Africa says no Nigerian died in the fresh attacks in the country but over 50
vehicles and other property worth millions of dollars owned by Nigerians were
vandalised, burnt or stolen.
Godwin Adama, Nigeria’s consul
general in Johannesburg, disclosed this in an in a telephone interview with NAN
on Tuesday.
The renewed xenophobic attacks on
Nigerians and other foreigners in Pretoria and Johannesburg took place between
August 28 and September 1.
The crisis resulted in looting
and burning of businesses and property belonging to foreigners and death of
five people.
“Several foreign owned shops were
targeted but it affected Nigerians greatly; over 50 vehicles in car marts owned
by Nigerians were vandalized, burnt or stolen, although few were reportedly
recovered,” he said.
“As at today, the situation is
calm, the only area there have been looting are the traders shops at a place
called Alexandra in South Africa, where shops were looted overnight.
“This is to show you that it is
not just Nigerians they have been looting, mostly foreigners that have shops
and businesses in South Africa.
“These include Indians, Chinese
and Pakistanis; where Indians have major malls have been locked, maybe they
will open today.”
He said “criminals” seized the
opportunity of the fire outbreak that occurred to loot property belonging to
foreigners and as such some people were affected.
“No Nigerian has been killed, and
the only thing that the criminals attacked were shops, because they may know
that such shops belong to foreign nationals,” he said.
“There is a place where only two
shops belonged to Nigerians out of the nine that were attacked, but there are
other places where there are more Nigerian shops in Marvel or Jules Street.
“These are areas Nigerians love a
lot, because we have large number of Nigerians there. So, some of the shops
were burnt and even looted and they lost a lot within these areas.
“There was not attack against
anybody, there was only attack on property and those property in business
areas.”
He said the African National Congress
(ANC) had condemned the attacks, dissociating the party and government from the
actions.
He added that the Nigeria high
commission in Pretoria and the Nigeria consulate in Johannesburg would put
measures in place to ensure coordinated response at the diplomatic level.
Click to signup for FREE news updates, latest information and hottest gists everyday
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com