THE SOUND OF VIOLENCE

Cops & residents plead with mense not to skiet klappers on Guy Fawkes

- BY KIM SWARTZ

AS CAPE Town braces for Guy Fawkes this Wednesday, cops and residents are pleading for calm, saying the fireworks bring fear, chaos and even tragedy.

For many Cape Flats residents, the days leading up to Guy Fawkes feels like life in a war zone, with children, pets and the elderly all on edge as fireworks echo through the night.

This year could be even more traumatising, with areas like Mitchells Plain, Hanover Park, Manenberg, Ocean View, Elsies River, Lavender Hill and Grassy Park reporting gunfire and running battles between gangs on a daily basis.

Retired Grassy Park station commander Lieutenant-Colonel Dawood Laing previously said that each year it causes a headache for cops because ahead of and on Guy Fawkes the klappertjies start going off and officers do not know if it's gunshots or fireworks.

He said that gangs also use the sound of fireworks as cover to confuse residents and authorities so that they can shoot.

Just under a month ago, 12-year-old Moegamat Faizel Challis was killed when gunmen opened fire on the corner of Moira and Wendy Street in Tafelsig and at first, his family thought the sounds were crackers.

His uncle Jodian Challis explained: “One of the people in the road passed away, so the family had the 40 nights according to the Islamic beliefs and they handed out party packets to the children.

"Faizel received his party packet and came back to the house and said to his mother that he wants to take his two younger siblings, aged 7 and 5, to get their party packets as well.