Greenmarket Square refugee sit-in

[7]The sit-in started when around 250 protestors[8] encamped outside the Cape Town offices of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) on 8 October 2019,[6] a month after the xenophobic motivated 2019 Johannesburg riots took place.

[21] By January 2020 concerns were increasingly raised about acts of violence between factions of protestors, sanitary conditions, as well as fire safety and overcrowding inside the Central Methodist Church.

The judgment also stated that the City of Cape Town must provide a venue and that the Department of Home Affairs must process the protesting refugees and determine their individual status and verification.

[32] Speaking for the City of Cape Town, Jean-Pierre Smith stated that a total of 781 protestors were recorded during the court mandated processing of refugee applications before evictions could take place.

[34] In late March the section led by Papy Sukami and now located outside the Central Police station requested that the City of Cape Town provide them accommodation during the period of the government-ordered national shutdown during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The group remaining in the Central Methodist Church, led by Balous, stated that they would not move in spite of the pandemic until they were provided with alternative accommodation they considered to be dignified and safe.

[35] On 2 April 2020 the last group of protestors were evicted from inside the Methodist Mission by SAPS following forcible evacuation orders in compliance with the nationwide lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic.

[46] Following the violence a restraining order was imposed on Balous requiring him to receive permission from the police before entering the Cape Town City Bowl area.

Protestors in mid-January 2020 occupying the area outside the Old Townhouse across the road from the Central Methodist Church which was occupied inside and outside by the protestors following their October 2019 eviction from the Waldorf Arcade.
South African police enforcing a court ordered eviction of protestors from the Waldorf Arcade on 30 October 2019. The protestors can be seen rejecting police calls and repeated warnings for them to voluntarily disperse. When police entered the Arcade protestors can be seen throwing projectiles and boiling milk at the police. Following the eviction the protest moved to the Central Methodist Mission.