{"id":165867,"date":"2020-09-15T23:18:43","date_gmt":"2020-09-15T21:18:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/article\/wildfires-leave-two-dead-100-homes-ashes\/"},"modified":"2020-09-15T23:18:43","modified_gmt":"2020-09-15T21:18:43","slug":"wildfires-leave-two-dead-100-homes-in-ashes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wildfires-leave-two-dead-100-homes-in-ashes\/","title":{"rendered":"Wildfires leave two dead, 100 homes in ashes"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"article_body\">\n<p><a class=\"bigger-image\" href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/media\/uploads\/images\/photographers\/Johnnie%20Isaac\/ngqeleni.jpeg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Photo of burnt landscape\" class=\"warn_big\" data-pagespeed-url-hash=\"2070768809\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/wildfires-leave-two-dead-100-homes-in-ashes.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"caption\">Wildfires swept through Mosi village in Ngqeleni area, Eastern Cape, leaving devastation behind. Photos: Johnnie Isaac<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Wildfires killed two people and destroyed about 100 homes in villages in Nyandeni, Eastern Cape.<\/li>\n<li>Villagers lost homes, belongings, livestock and their harvest.<\/li>\n<li>They are pleading for government assistance.<\/li>\n<li>The mayor says they are bringing together various departments to offer help.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Wildfires have left at least two people dead and about 100 homes destroyed in four villages in Ngqeleni in the Eastern Cape.<\/p>\n<p>Residents from Mosi Village said the fire started in bushes on Sunday morning and was fanned by high winds.<\/p>\n<p>Villagers say they tried to douse the flames with water and wet tree branches, but they could not get the blaze under control and some had to run for their lives.<\/p>\n<p>A 30-year-old woman, Sinazo Mzamo, and a 10-year-old boy, Babalo Mamane, died in the fire.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking for Babalo\u2019s family, his uncle 74-year-old Ratsho Ponco said: \u201cWe are heartbroken at the loss of life we have experienced in this family.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ponco said: \u201cWe have lost everything. Furniture, groceries, harvest produced, gardens and kraals \u2026 I have nothing else to wear except the clothes I\u2019m wearing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"bigger-image\" href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/media\/uploads\/images\/photographers\/Johnnie%20Isaac\/theliswa-mntombi.jpeg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Photo of a woman in front of a burnt out house\" class=\"warn_big\" data-pagespeed-url-hash=\"3625018324\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/wildfires-leave-two-dead-100-homes-in-ashes-1.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"caption\">Theliswa Mntombi lost all four of her rondavels in the fire.<\/p>\n<p>Theliswa Mntombi lost all four of her rondavels. She was helping her neighbours extinguish the<span> fire when they realised her huts<\/span><span> were burning.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u201cI didn\u2019t have any chance to remove my belongings. Everything from the bed, fridge, clothes and groceries perished here. I plead for government assistance to rebuild my home,\u201d said Mntombi.<\/p>\n<p>She is temporarily staying with neighbours.<\/p>\n<p>Nokhanyo Maqhinga said she was at church when they heard about the fire. \u201cWe are grateful that we still have a roof over our heads, but we lost household goods including our Identity Documents and SASSA cards. I\u2019m worried because my daughter is about to write matric exams,\u201d said Maqhinga.<\/p>\n<p>OR Tambo District Municipality spokesperson Zimkhitha Macingwane said, \u201cOur disaster management officials are assessing the damages.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Nyandeni Local Municipality Mayor Mesuli Ngqondwana visited the area. \u201cLots of people have been left homeless and are without food. We are in the process of bringing together government departments such as Social Development and Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs to intervene and we are calling for anyone that can help,\u201d said Ngqondwana.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"bigger-image\" href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/media\/uploads\/images\/photographers\/Johnnie%20Isaac\/mosi_village.jpeg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Photo of villagers sitting on the ground\" class=\"warn_big\" data-pagespeed-url-hash=\"591378765\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/wildfires-leave-two-dead-100-homes-in-ashes-2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"caption\">Mosi villagers sit near the ruins of Theliswa Mntombi\u2019s burnt rondavels.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"article-copyright\">\n<p>\u00a9 2020 GroundUp. This article is licensed under a <a href=\"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nd\/4.0\/\" rel=\"license\">Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>You may republish this article, so long as you credit the authors and GroundUp, and do not change the text. Please include a link back to the original article.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/wildfires-leave-two-dead-100-homes-in-ashes.jpg\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/\">Source: GroundUp<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Wildfires swept through Mosi village in Ngqeleni area, Eastern Cape, leaving devastation behind. Photos: Johnnie Isaac Wildfires killed two people and destroyed about 100 homes in villages in Nyandeni, Eastern Cape. Villagers lost homes, belongings, livestock and their harvest. They are pleading for government assistance. The mayor says they are bringing together various departments to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":165868,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9928],"tags":[28001],"class_list":{"0":"post-165867","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-groundup","8":"tag-groundup","9":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/wildfires-leave-two-dead-100-homes-in-ashes.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165867","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=165867"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165867\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/165868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=165867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=165867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=165867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}