South Africans attacked police officers on the streets of Cape Town on Tuesday as the effects of a Coronavirus inspired lockdown bites harder.
Police fired rubber bullets and teargas at residents protesting their lack of access to food aid being provided by the South African Government to try to ease the effects of the lockdown.
148 people have been arrested so far since the Coronavirus lockdown, considered as one of the strictest in the world, was announced on March 27.
Hundreds of South Africans took to the streets to fight pitched battles with the police, throwing rocks and setting up barricades with burning tyres.
According to reports, the clashes occured because of undelivered food parcels in Mitchells Plain.
A resident, Nazile Bobbs who spoke to the press said:
“We have small children. We want to eat. They must also eat. They said we are going to get parcels, where (are) the parcels? How long are we (going to be) in the lockdown?”
South Africa currently has more than 2400 confirmed Coronavirus cases and was already in a recession before the pandemic hit.
The country has undergone a wave of violent crime since the start of the Coronavirus lockdown.
Dozens of schools have been burgled and vandalised while electric cables owned by electricity provider ESKOM are being stolen at will.
Millions of South Africans were already jobless before the pandemic and millions more who are daily wage earners have lost their sources of income.
President Cyril Ramaphosa promised to provide food and water to the poorest south Africans but it seems the packages are not going around fast enough.