'Zimbabwe is our Zion'

By Luvuyo Mjekula

Squeezing each other's hands, seemingly oblivious to the tears running down their faces, a group of women form a circle.

One woman dressed in blue overalls shouts: "For the sake of Zimbabwe I shall not keep still.

Zimbabwe is our Zion - for its sake I will not sleep." Amen! The others shout back while singing and dancing. It's a prayer meeting and this group of 12 Zimbabwean refugees have decided to seek divine intervention to their plight.

They spent the previous night (Tuesday) in a sports ground after being forced out of their homes by their South African neighbours on Tuesday morning. Their clothes were thrown out and their corrugated iron shacks broken down.

The woman in the middle is Eugen Musungata, a 39-year-old deacon. She came to live in De Doorns a few months ago, following her husband. She dropped out of the Women University in Africa in Harare without completing her first semester for her BSc degree in Business Management and Entrepreneurship. The situation in Zimbabwe was bad and she hoped for a better life in South Africa. Like many other refugees she says she is a professional and does not deserve the treatment she is getting from South Africans.

"This situation is not normal," she says, referring to the thousands of other Zimbabweans doing their laundry, cooking and washing themselves in the sports ground. But they are determined to defy the odds against them. They smile as they relay their stories of being forcefully evicted by "fed-up" South African residents who accused them of stealing their jobs.

luvuyo.mjekula@inl.co.za

This breaking news flash was supplied exclusively to iol.co.za by the news desk at our sister title, Cape Times.

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