“Cape Town treats dogs much better than homeless people.”
This is how Carin Gelderbloem, 51, who has been living on and off Cape Town streets since 2011, describes how homeless people are treated by the city’s law-enforcement officials.
She accuses the DA-led city of Cape Town, which bills itself as a caring city, of treating the homeless like “enemies of the metro” and “with disrespect all the time”.
One of the continent’s wealthiest cities boasting some of the most exclusive and trendy suburbs such as Camps Bay, Clifton and Constantia, Cape Town has a homelessness crisis and the problem is worsening partly due to the Covid-19-induced economic crisis that has led to a jobs bloodbath and psychological trauma.
The crisis in the city is a microcosm of the inequality and poverty issues that continue to plague SA, a country that remains one of the world’s most economically unequal.
While the crisis and bylaws that effectively criminalise rough sleeping are not unique to Cape Town, the city has been under the spotlight for its perceived harsh treatment of homeless people with many of them fined or arrested, and allegedly constantly harassed for living on the streets.
Gelderbloem is one of the many homeless people in Cape Town that feel aggrieved by the city’s approach. She lost her home after her husband died in 2006 and she could not afford the bond repayments on her own. She subsequently moved in with her sister in Mitchells Plain, a township on the outskirts of Cape Town. Gelderbloem says she did not get along with her sibling and they fought all the time, which eventually forced her to live on the streets from 2011.
According to the city’s figures, about 6,000 people are living on the streets across the metro. Non-governmental organisations (NGOs), including U-turn, a faith-based organisation that assists homeless people, conservatively estimate the number to be about 14,000.
All we want is for people to be treated with dignity and respect, even if they are homeless. I am praying for the court case to go our way
— Carin Gelderbloem, Cape Town homeless person
NGOs say their city shelters, struggling for funding, can accommodate up to about 3,000 people. Even when space is available, some shelters require some form of payment starting from about R15 a night, which is unaffordable for most of the homeless.
In a recent report, U-turn cites global research showing that homelessness has detrimental consequences for individuals on the street and society. Living on the street causes a decline in physical and mental health, and an increase in trauma and injury due to a lack of safety.
Housed residents face an increase in begging and littering as well as a perceived decrease in safety. This, some observers point out, can also lead to a marked drop in property values in the affected suburbs, a big concern for homeowners.
Gelderbloem, who has a hairdressing qualification but has struggled to land a steady job, alleges the city’s law-enforcement officials, intent on removing homeless people off the streets, confiscated her property including a sleeping bag, identity documents, dentures and jewellery beads, which she relied on to make money to buy food and other essentials.
After running battles with the city, Gelderbloem and 10 other homeless people with the help of Cape Town-based activist organisation Ndifuna Ukwazi recently approached the Western Cape High Court to challenge the constitutionality of the bylaws that in effect criminalise homelessness.
Gelderbloem and her co-applicants — most of whom list their place of residence as Hope Street in the Cape Town CBD, a stone’s throw from parliament — have also approached the Equality Court to challenge the discriminatory nature of the bylaws.
They want the streets, public places and the prevention of noise nuisances as well as the integrated waste management bylaws set aside.
They also want the city to pay each applicant R5,000 in damages and to issue a formal apology.
In her affidavit in the high court case Gelderbloem says that in applying the waste bylaw the city’s law- enforcement officers have routinely incorrectly classified the personal belongings of homeless people as litter or waste.
The city is opposing the application. A court date is yet to be set.
Recently, the city council raised eyebrows when it issued a statement effectively urging residents to submit complaints about the homeless, ostensibly to bolster its case.
Responding to questions from Business Day, the city says it serves the whole of Cape Town and its constituents, and is therefore entitled to request information from all of its residents to assess the effect of homeless street people on the broader population.
The city is also at pains to highlight that addressing homelessness is the responsibility of the national and provincial government, who jointly hold the constitutional mandate and budgets for welfare services. But with the state finances under huge strain, there is not enough money to tackle the growing crisis.
Cape Town says it goes beyond its mandate by providing social development programmes for street people, including access to substance-abuse rehabilitation, assistance with obtaining identity documents and social grants and short-term job opportunities through the Expanded Public Works Programme.
The city states that it is responsible for enforcing its bylaws, which apply to everyone who lives in, works in or visits the city “and from time to time this includes street people”.
The city emphasises that the reasons for people living on the street are both structural and individual. Homelessness can be linked to unemployment, fractured family relationships, eviction, as well as individual factors such as substance abuse, mental illness or criminal involvement. Thus, according to the city, not everyone who finds themselves on the streets is homeless.
Danielle Louw, a lawyer for Ndifuna Ukwazi, notes that the city has a few social development interventions but these are nullified by an approach that fines street people who conduct life-sustaining activities such as sleeping, camping, resting, bathing, erecting a shelter or keeping personal belongings in public.
What is needed, according to Louw, is a radical shift from an emphasis on punitive measures, to one that is centred on meeting street people’s basic needs.
For Gelderbloem, the looming court battle is a chance for homeless people to be heard. She says it could mark the beginning of a new chapter for many people forced to live on the streets.
“All we want is for people to be treated with dignity and respect, even if they are homeless. I am praying for the court case to go our way,” Gelderbloem says.
It is a dilemma for city bosses. Many of the homeless have nowhere to go, but it is unhygienic and unsafe for people to live on the streets — making fires to cook, bathing and relieving themselves in public spaces. An urgent solution is needed.
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