SHOTS FIRED!

Sunkist Estate was a quiet neighbourhood in the mid-1940s. Tracts of vacant plots overgrown with Port Jackson bush stretched across a huge swathe of undeveloped land. It was earmarked as a settlement for returning soldiers who had put their life on the line in support of what had essentially begun as a European conflict. South Africa, as a Commonwealth Dominion, had joined the bitter conflagration before it had spread across the globe into another World War. 

From 1945 onwards, the Union Defence Force started the process of demobilisation – a slow, tedious and frustrating event for young men wishing to return to civilian life and get on with the celebration of their survival by re-engaging in the world of work. Thousands didn’t get that opportunity and lay where they had fallen, mainly in the deserts of North Africa. Industrial development had taken place at a steady pace, mainly focused on support of the war effort. As the economy began to adapt to the required peacetime growth that was consumer driven rather than as a military imperative, these chaps would of necessity be integrated into this changing economic reality. There was also a demand for foreign expertise to be imported as a gap filler until sufficient skills could be unlocked locally, as a mining and mineral exporting economy was being transformed into that of a modern industrialised state. These developments hastened the need to provide adequate accommodation for the new families that would be settling in the metropolitan areas where the opportunities for employment were more readily available.

Some young families made use of generous state schemes to encourage home ownership, and they purchased the first of the new modest homes erected on the outskirts of the Cape Town Metropole. Generally they were keen to get on with their lives and raise families for a new, changed world – very different from the one in which they had grown up. Wartime experiences would, sadly, linger and blight the lives of many returning combatants – memories of traumatic experiences could not simply be “switched off”. In later years, the condition that had been known as “shell shock” would be more accurately described as PTSD (Post-traumatic Stress Disorder). The ghosts of shocking experiences in which the worst excesses of humanity had been witnessed (and sometimes participated in), would return to haunt many fellows in their new circumstances.

South Africa was a country in which handguns and hunting rifles proliferated. For many men (and some women) guns were a sine qua non – people owned them for a variety of reasons which included self defence especially for those residing in lonely areas, for sport and for hunting. Some didn’t really need a reason – they simply wanted to own them and licences were issued without too much fuss. Given the psychological powder keg that was created by the emergence from a hellish conflict and the frayed nerves of many a poor soul anxiously navigating a dramatically changed society, perhaps greater care should have been taken in controlling the issuing of licences for deadly weapons. It is a fine line that the state needs to tread between legitimate security concerns, the safety of innocents and what was viewed as an inherent right to bear arms. Good sense has to be balanced with avoidance of a “nanny state” set-up where governments seek to regulate every detail of people’s lives. 

It was in these circumstances that a young family purchased one of the first little houses that was made available for habitation. The concept being promoted was clear: purchase a small and affordable house and, as a family ascends the socio-economic ladder, it could be upgraded and renovated to meet changing needs. The anticipation was that this would promote social mobility. For the most part, it was a sound system that worked reasonably well. However, wherever governments are involved in schemes involving construction and investment, streams of chancers and crooks follow in their wake. Opportunities for corruption and “feathering one’s own nest” abound. There were many cases of folk purchasing property and illegally renting out houses they have secured the title deeds to, and not occupying the premises themselves. Nefarious schemes for self-enrichment nudged the noble concept of creating social mobility aside and there was the potential that, if left unchecked, this could escalate into an unintended consequence – the emergence of slumlords and the slow degradation of areas ring-fenced for development and the betterment of people’s lives. Sunkist never developed into a slum area, but the odd rascal bent the rules and dubious types did rent some of the houses, no background checks having been done.

Having settled in what was a peaceful and quiet area, what could be loosely described as another family apparently moved in as tenants a few yards along the gravel road that hinted at proper infrastructure development in the area. It soon transpired that this would become a rowdy lot that would rattle a few cages in the community. The couple clearly didn’t manage a traditional family arrangement at that time – dad (perhaps only to some of the kids) was a rather scruffy, obnoxious type who, to the relief of neighbours, had no intention of integrating himself with the community. A bit surly, he had an aura about him which conveyed the message: “Just leave me alone.” The woman seemed a tad bedraggled and wearily took care of a seemingly complex operation to keep her numerous scallywag kids in line. No-one really counted, but it seemed that she had given birth roughly every nine months and three seconds, and was showing signs of more on the way. She cut a rather sad and tortured figure in this quasi family.

The first sign of trouble came late one night when this frail waif of a woman, understandably rather unkempt given her situation, knocked on the front door. Invited in and offered a strong cup of coffee which she seemed to need quite desperately, she regaled her neighbour about a predicament that, by her account, played itself out all too often in that household. She had been ejected from the home with some of the children in tow. Husband then hit the road, ostensibly in search of an open pub or free liquor with one of the few buddies he might still have had. It was a typical Cape Town winter, cold and drizzly – not ideal conditions in which to find oneself locked out of the house. Her request was simple: break and enter, locate the spare key and open up for her and her coterie of youngsters.

As a good neighbour would, putting aside good sense, an open bathroom window was located. Screwdriver in hand, the burglar bars were duly removed and access to the house gained. It was an alarming panorama that confronted the good Samaritan. The key had to be located in what amounted to a hoarder’s larder. Strewn across the house were remnants of clothing, used crockery, and accumulated filth. Careful steps had to be taken to avoid evidence left behind of the presence of pets. Key located, the troop was let in and the courtesy of good wishes for a peaceful night extended. The return home was duly followed by a warm bath and proper sanitisation of every scrap of attire that had entered the neighbour’s house. Mercifully, upon the drunken jerk’s return home, he slept the booze off (heaven knows where he found a place to lay his head in that infestation) and apparently had no recollection of having locked his family out.

Everybody returned to the normal humdrum of making a living and making a life. Normality lasted but a few days before the next fracas.

The commotion that woke the neighbourhood one rainy night was a portent of worse to come. Dishes were heard crashing against the walls in this infernal scene of bedlam. Screams, the shattering of windows and slamming of doors punctured the serenity of Sunkist Estate. A gushing stream of expletives emanated from what was apparently the lunatic’s vocal cavity. From the poor woman emerged shrieks that punctuated the depravity of her immediate surrounds. About to invoke the long arm of the law, the pandemonium suddenly abated and he could be seen exiting the front door and taking off with gusto down the gravel road. Checking on the woman, it transpired that she was battered and bruised, but still able to gather her terrified offspring that she was now comforting as best she could. Declining to press charges or seek an interdict, there was little the community could do to assuage the terror of gender based violence unfolding at this location. The neighbours were aghast, yet powerless. This was a time before safe houses for abused women. It was a time in which women were afforded little protection, sympathy or credibility by the authorities. Her protestations that she was dragged about the house by her hair, brutally kicked and beaten, would, she feared, not be taken seriously enough to offer sufficient protection against an abuser in whose warped mind, his wife (or partner) should be barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen – a concept she knew all too well would be shared by the very officials whose duty it was to render aid to the victim.

The writing was on the wall, as the neighbours were well aware. Sooner or later a heinous crime would befall this terrified waif – and possibly the children, too.

Calm descended upon the Estate yet again.

It was not unexpected that an uproar would one fine evening explode and shatter the serenity of sanity. The Beast was at it again! This time shots rang out as he brazenly gesticulated, pistol in hand, all the while pressing the trigger and sending chips of plaster to the floor. Before the dust settled and before the house could be littered with bodies, the crazy fellow burst out of the door again. In his wake he left a cowering woman in a corner of the bedroom and stunned, quivering youngsters scarred for life, having witnessed and experienced the havoc of the crime of gender violence that it would still take years to recognise as a societal problem in need of urgent and effective tackling.

On this occasion the neighbours would have no more of it! The police were summoned and placed a guard at the scene to prevent mayhem should the scoundrel return that night. When he did make an appearance some days later – long after the police protection had quit the scene – he was meek and she not inclined to press charges. Motivated by the fear of being left destitute, she chose to rather risk her life than rattle the bastard’s cage – “bastard” used here to denote ‘despicable’.

One night thereafter – to be accurate, MIDNIGHT – a battered truck pitched up at the house. Furniture was loaded and the family was never seen or heard of again – certainly not in this area. Of course, the rent was left unpaid, though no-one felt a modicum of sympathy for the illegal landlord. No doubt, other creditors were also left smarting.

What did remain was a sense of relief that the neighbourhood was somewhat cleansed of this blight. Also a deep and bitter abhorrence of the perpetrator. And compassion for the woman and her children who suffered the indignity as well as the blunt end of this gender driven criminal violence.

It was not the first incident of this nature, nor will it be the last. Society must do better than this! Victims must be taken seriously and attitudes regarding the treatment of ones fellow human beings need to change drastically and rapidly should there be any possibility of stemming the tide of a damaged generation perpetuating all manner of social ills.

©Paul M Haupt