S. Africa rapidly evicts squatters

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- Private security guards are swiftly demolishing squatters' shacks near Johannesburg in an effort to clear them from land illegally occupied.

CNN's Charlayne Hunter-Gault said the scene was "incredible" as the security officers -- dubbed by squatters as "red ants -- carrying crow bars and plastic shields, made their way toward the squatters.

She said the squatters were begging for the eviction to stop, so they could return to court to argue their case. But she added the commander of the guards said demolition of the corrugated iron and wooden shacks would begin straight away.

They had destroyed about a third of the hundreds of shacks in a couple of hours, most of which were unoccupied after the squatters had left in the run-up to the operation.

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No confrontation between the squatters and guards has been reported so far, but Hunter-Gault said the bulk of the squatters remained in a different part of the vast territory outside Johannesburg's airport.

The government was given the power by a court judge on Tuesday to remove the hundreds of squatters who had paid $3 (25 rand) for a patch of the dusty land.

The squatters are demanding that the transfer of white-owned land to dispossessed blacks is speeded up in line with pledges made by the African National Congress during the 1994 election.

Judge Carel Rabie had given the squatters 48 hours to leave the land owned by private companies and the government, saying the area posed a health hazard to both squatters and nearby residents.

But the squatters have remained, arguing the government has not given them an alternative and that they have nowhere else to go.

The government, concerned that if it uses force to remove the squatters parallels will be drawn between its actions and the behaviour of the apartheid regime when blacks were forcibly evicted from land, look to be using the security guards rather than its own police force.

It is also aware of the bad publicity the land grab violence by war veterans in neighbouring Zimbabwe has generated around the world.

Opposition parties criticised the government, saying it should do more for the landless.

The United Democratic Movement (UDM) said: "The homeless and destitute of South Africa have for far too long been marginalised."

The white-led main opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) said it had sent trucks to help squatters take their belongings from the camp.

The government's attempt to remove the squatters began on Thursday morning when about 60 security guards were trucked into the area, backed up by about 200 policemen who stood on the perimeters of the site.

Hunter-Gault said: "One mother was saying she is going to stay, not because she is defiant, but because she has nowhere else to go."

Another mother was in tears, Hunter-Gault added, as her shack was dismantled leaving just her belongings outside.

"The guards are moving with rapid speed through this section...but as soon as they finish the big challenge will be what is going to happen to the squatters."

Churches had tried to reach some compromise, but without success.

The squatters have been backed by the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) which is angry at the pace of the government's efforts to restore land to those dispossessed under apartheid and to transform the ownership of land which is still skewed in favour of the white minority.

The African National Congress government has made land reform one of its priorities after winning power in 1994 to rectify the land imbalance caused by decades of apartheid rule when blacks were forced off their land to make way for whites.

Under successive white governments, about 80 percent of South Africa was designated for white occupation, while the black majority had limited rights in roughly 20 percent of the country, usually in the most remote, undeveloped areas.

Between 1960 and 1983, three million black people were forcibly displaced by the apartheid system.