THE death toll from sweeping anti-immigrant riots in Johannesburg suburbs rose to five Tuesday as police attempted to restore order with rubber bullets.

Large sections of Africa’s largest and wealthiest city were deserted as tens of thousands of workers, commuters and school children stayed home to avoid violence directed at “foreigners” from other parts of Africa.

Rocks, bricks and rubber bullets lay strewn across the empty streets of Alexandra after mobs plundered the township overnight, burning and looting shops in their path.

Police presence remained heavy after officers fired rubber bullets to disperse the last of the crowds.

Many shops owned by “foreigners” were looted on a second night of urban rioting where hundreds of people marched through the streets Monday in an unusually large expression of anti-foreigner sentiment.

Such violence breaks out sporadically in South Africa, where many locals blame immigrants for high unemployment, particularly in manual labor.

“They beat up everyone they could see, they didn’t check to see who owned the shops, whether it was a foreigner or a South African shop,” said a Zimbabwe carpenter who asked not to be named.

Another migrant, reluctant to say where he came from, who lives in shabby Malvern suburb close to the city center, said, “The people are going for Nigerians as they do drugs.”

At least five people died, according to authorities, and about 100 were arrested since the word went around last weekend that there would be a purge on migrants this week.

(SD-Agencies)