RUST and overgrown grass are the first things that welcome you when you enter the home of gogo Anah Lekgari in Orlando East, Soweto.
The 74-year-old has been living alone in a dilapidated house with no running water and electricity and desperately needs help.
According to gogo's daughter, Bridget, her mother has been living alone because of trust issues.
“Some years back her drinking buddy tried to sell her house and she was almost evicted. The new owners wanted to occupy the house. Fortunately, the community stood with her. She was thrown out of the house again and the community had to intervene again,” said Bridget.
Bridget told Daily Sun gogo has not been the same since the two incidents, which occurred in the early 2000s.
“Since then, she started to lock herself in the house. She doesn’t trust anyone. She thinks anyone who tries to befriend her has other intentions.
“I think my mum suffered some disturbances and it’s like she is not mentally fit. I can’t even clean my mother’s yard; she tends to get violent. If I ever want to see her, I visit the neighbours and hope to see her walk up the street. All hell breaks loose if she sees me in her yard,” said Bridget.
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When Daily Sun visited gogo’s house, the SunTeam was met by uncut grass which covered the entire yard, while the house was dilapidated and looked unkept.
Ndivhuwo Liphadzi from the non-government organisation, Kasi Hero Foundation, called on partners to help them clean gogo’s yard.
“It has come to our attention that gogo also doesn’t receive any form of monetary support from anyone and lives off the food she gets from her neighbhours. We tried to speak to her daughter who has since informed us that they are not on good terms,” said Ndivhuwo.
Meanwhile, Eskom spokeswoman Daphne Mokwena said gogo needs to log a fault with their call centre on 08600 37566 so that the power utility can send a technician to investigate and restore the electricity.
“We also have the Alfred App which can be used as an alternative to log a fault swiftly,” she said.
