A CAPE Town family has appealed to the community of Khayelitsha to help them bury their four children who died in a shack fire this week.

Tebogo Matewu, 13, Masithembe Matewu, 12, Nthabiseng Matewu, 7, and Sesona Matewu, 20 months, burnt to death in the family' s shack in Makhaza, Khayelitsha, on Monday.

Their mother, Bulelwa Matewu, 45, suffered severe burns and is in a critical condition in hospital.

Only one Matewu child is alive.

She was with her mother at the time of the fire.

"I received a call from a neighbour on Monday morning telling me about the fire. I was shocked.

I couldn't work and I'm still traumatised," Bulelwa's brother,Monwabisi Mngcwengi said.

He said nobody knows what caused the fire.

He said he saw his sister and her children on Sunday night when they were sitting around a heater.

Mngcwengi said he did not know how they would bury the children because the entire family was unemployed.

The children's grandmother, Nowelile Tom, said it was a tragedy and she longed to bury the children on their ancestral land at Mount Fletcher in Eastern Cape.

The first person to see the fire, neighbour Abongile Mahlombe, said it started at about 4am.

"I heard somebody screaming and there was a bright light in the house shining through the window.

I jumped up and rushed to the house. I kicked open the front door and Bulelwa came out screaming and shouting:

"Abantwana bam (my children)," Mahlombe said.

He said he went inside but could only search one room of the shack because the other room was engulfed in flames.

ANC councilor Danile Khatshwa said that the City of Cape Town had donated 10 sheets of zinc and five planks to rebuild the family's shack.