Durban blanket drive brings relief to displaced foreign nationals sleeping outdoors
A Durban volunteer launched a blanket drive to support displaced foreign nationals sleeping outdoors amid winter cold while awaiting transport.
As displaced foreign nationals continue sleeping on Durban pavements in bitter winter conditions while waiting for transport north, a local resident has launched a blanket-and-sock drive to help keep them warm.
A group of mostly Malawian nationals is still camping outside Durban's former Old Drive-In site and the Home Affairs Refugee Reception Centre on Moore Road.
A volunteer says she was compelled to act after seeing hundreds of people, including families, sleeping in the open without blankets, warm clothing or adequate shelter.
" I saw fellow humans who are sleeping on the cold pavement and the dusty ground, many without blankets, some without socks or hats or beanies. And I just thought if I'm cold in my home, that they must be freezing outside with no roof over their head.”
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She says relief organisations CityHope and Generation of Radicals are providing food and water, but warm clothing, blankets, and transport remain the most urgent needs while they wait.
“My biggest wish is that people would respond with compassion and remember that we are all human, and that these people deserve kindness and dignity and love. And then also that people would do their homework and find out that all foreigners are here on different statuses, and not to paint everyone with the same brush as illegal immigrants”
Meanwhile, the Border Management Authority says more than 45,000 undocumented foreign nationals have now been processed through the Temporary Repatriation Centre in Musina.
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