I walk in to the small wooden shack where Ronel Fernadez (31) and her two daughters Melissa (12) and Jessica (9) live. It’s a tidy room, decorated with harts and wooden carvings, but the furniture is old and the bedroom, kitchen and living room is all cramped into one.
Ronel lives in her father’s backyard in Pretoria North, along with her sister and two brothers who each have their own Wendy houses on the property.
Now they have received an evacuation order from the city of Tshwane
“We are too poor to afford anything else, what are we to do? Put up camp in the felt?” Ronel asked.
Further along the road various squatter houses in back yards are visible. These people didn’t received notice to evacuate the premises.
“It isn’t fair. What is applicable to one should be applicable to the other,” Ronel said.
When I walk out of the dark, cramped wooden house Ronel looks at me pleadingly.
“My daughter will be celebrating her 13th birthday soon. Am I supposed to tell her that she won’t have somewhere to live on her birthday?”
