Six homesteads have been torched in a feud between residents of Zitha and Sicambeni villages, outside Lusikisiki in the Eastern Cape. This comes after the two villages got involved in a fighting over demarcation.
The villagers say there is already a river separating the two villages which can be used as the border. The villages under the Khanyayo administrative area also do not want to fall under the same traditional leader.
A community member, Xolisile Sikhonza, says it’s alleged that three homesteads were torched overnight.
Sikhonza claims the local chief, Sonwabile Mangolwandle Jama is not doing anything to try and solve the matter.
“There’s a quarrel here and people are fighting. What’s happening is that when an administrative area is formed, it consists of villages; maybe about seven villages. After the villages are counted then they’re allocated a traditional leader who will lead them. Now, the residents of the each of the two villages want to be separated, even though they fall under the same administrative area. We tried to solve the problem because we were of the view that the chief cannot support that. A task team from the administrative area was formed to investigate the matter and it did,” says Sikhonza.
Local traditional leader, Chief Mangolwandle Jama, has refuted the residents’ claims that he’s not doing anything to solve the matter. He says he called for government intervention when the feud started.
“My suggestion was that government must come and intervene. I called the mayor, Brigadier SAPS, Pops will come to try and resolve the matter. The matter is between those two sub-villagers at Khanyayo. It’s that situation at the moment, but as things stand now it is all quiet,” explains Mangolwandle.
