A report about a fire in a building in South Africa that killed 76 people last year found that the city authorities should be held responsible because they knew about safety problems in the building at least four years before the fire.
There was a big fire at a tall building in downtown Johannesburg on August 31 was one of the biggest tragedies in South Africa. At least 12 kids died and 86 people got hurt. Some had to jump out of windows to get away from the fire.
Some people said they dropped little kids out of the windows, hoping that someone below would catch them. A lot of the people who died were badly burned and couldn’t be recognized because they were stuck in a building with too many people. It took the police a long time to figure out who the bodies were using DNA tests.
Former Judge Sisi Khampepe was chosen to lead the investigation, which started in October. She gave the first part of her report on Sunday and said that the City of Johannesburg, which owns the building, did not care about its very bad condition.
After the fire, many people were discovered living in the building without permission. Some of them had built homes in the hallways, bathrooms and basement, which was supposed to be a place for cars to park. Emergency services said that the fire extinguishers were removed from the walls and the main fire escape was locked on the night of the fire.
The building was full of trash and had a lot of makeshift wooden shacks inside. This made the fire even more dangerous, according to Khampepe’s report.
In 2019, government and police officials looked through the building and found that the bad living conditions there made the fire worse, according to Khampepe.
She thinks the boss of the Johannesburg Property Company should be punished because he oversees the city’s buildings. She also said that the building should be torn down and a plaque put up in memory of the many people who were hurt.
The sad event showed how some areas of South Africa’s largest city and main business center have become run-down. Many buildings have been taken over by landlords who are renting out space to people who are in desperate need of a place to live. The buildings are very full and safety rules are not followed.
In January, something surprising happened at the investigation. A man who was supposed to speak there said he set the fire to burn the body of a man he had killed for a drug dealer.
The man who admitted to committing a terrible crime was taken into custody and accused of 76 counts of murder and starting fires.