Was it patriotic or xenophobic – Life after 30 June
Vuyisani Gwebani
BALLENGEICH. A month ago, voice notes circulated on WhatsApp telling residents to chase foreign nationals out. By the weekend of 30 June, shops with foreign owners were raided, containers were forced shut, and the chant “Abahambe” echoed through the village.
Today the containers are locked. The streets are quieter. And the jobs people were promised have not come. On the corner near the taxi rank, two young men sit on a concrete slab where they used to offload stock for Amush’s container. Amush is gone. “We were making R250 a day loading, sweeping, sometimes selling airtime,” says one of them. “Now nothing. We just wait.” According to community tallies shared with Ihawulezwe Social Movement, the raids have cost Ballengeich 7 jobs and created 0.
That is the economic ledger residents are now reading. The textile factory on the edge of Ballengeich has been closed for 18 months. The RDP housing list has not moved in two years. The local Home Affairs office requires people to travel to town and still queue from 4am, only to be turned away. There is no municipal SMME fund that traders here can access. Into that gap, foreign-owned shops had stepped in. They gave credit when SASSA was late. They sold paraffin for R5. They hired locally.
With those shops closed, the credit books are closed too. “Last week my grant was delayed by three days,” says a mother of three who asked not to be named. “I had to go to a mashonisa. 30 percent in one month. Last time I did that I was still paying in February.”
Politically, the raids were framed as an act of reclaiming the economy for South Africans. They fractured relationships that had been built over years of borrowing sugar, sharing transport, and buying on tick. The police confirmed arrests were made during the unrest, but residents say there has been no follow-up on business permits, no plan to reopen trading, and no protection for anyone who wants to trade lawfully.
Voice notes moved faster than any pamphlet and carried more weight than a councillor’s meeting. No official verification was attached. By the time community leaders tried to respond, the shops were already being emptied.
With fewer shops walking distance, people now spend more on transport to town. Food costs more there. Waste piles up around the locked containers because no one is sweeping or paying for removal anymore.
Ihawulezwe Social Movement, which has been documenting the aftermath, argues the problem was misdiagnosed. “This isn’t only about patriotism versus xenophobia,” a spokesperson said. “It’s about anger aimed at the wrong door. The doors that are actually closed are the factory, Home Affairs, and the funding office.”
The group is demanding four things: that Home Affairs be fixed and staffed so people can get IDs and permits without leaving Ballengeich, that government start public works projects to absorb the unemployed youth at the rank, that all traders be protected and allowed to operate within the law regardless of nationality, and that service delivery be addressed so housing lists move and local businesses can get support.
Town officials have not announced any new jobs for Ballengeich since the raids. Capital has moved to town, where larger retailers are now getting the spend that used to circulate here. Trust between neighbors has thinned. And in households where grants are the only income, hunger has grown sharper in the last three weeks.
Ballengeich is described by some on social media as “clean” now. On the ground, clean means shuttered. Clean means quiet. Cleaning does not feed children.
“Together we build solutions,” the Movement’s statement ends. For the two men at the rank, that cannot come soon enough. They are still waiting for the work that was promised when the containers were told to go.
