Johannesburg- As the crisis for burial space in cemeteries worsens with reported shrinking space for burial sites in cities and towns as the Covid-19 pandemic is showing no respite, residents of Ekurhuleni face another problem of gigantic proportion – the unavailability of crematoriums.
Business development manager Lucky Radebe of the B3 funeral parlour in Benoni, Ekurhuleni, decried the fact that it was taking the City of Ekurhuleni “like forever” to fix the crematoriums.
Radebe said the Lala Ngoxolo crematorium in Crystal Park, Benoni, was in a state of disrepair, with inferior and ageing cremators dating back to more than 50 years, being poorly serviced and unable to function optimally.
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Radebe told Sunday World this week that the provision of cremation service was often interrupted “because of poor maintenance, which is a sad reality that affects our bereaved clients who demand this service as regularly as possible as part of a call to carry out the wishes of the dead”.
He added that there was a growing number of African people who demanded cremation, and the myth that this was a white or Indian culture had to be refuted.
“The failure by the municipality to provide first-rate cremation facilities to meet the growing demands of our communities is shameful and a blot to the wishes of the dead.”
He said it boggled the mind that it was taking so long for the council to seriously att end to this “persistent problem”.
“Do our local government leaders think this did not matter? If so, I suggest they are not in touch with the needs of the communities they are expected to serve.”
Referring to a crematorium in Crystal Park, Radebe said: “As we understand it, the council is in this mess because the person who got the tender to fix the crematoriums did not do justice to the work because he had no knowledge, or engineering expertise of how crematoriums work, and the incorrect material he used to fix the problem worsened the situation.
“We have to travel to far-away places such as Krugersdorp, and at exorbitant cost, which we as undertakers have to carry because we can’t in good conscience pass it on to our heavily burdened bereaved clients.”
DA councillor for ward 25 Pieter Henning said: “Once again the City of Ekurhuleni has let the residents down by failing to repair the crematorium at Lala Ngoxolo cemetery despite committing to do so on numerous occasions.
“The department of parks and cemeteries closed the facility in 2019 due to the crematorium being in a state of disrepair, and this has caused a great deal of inconvenience to various communities and undertakers .”
By Friday afternoon, Ekurhuleni spokesperson Zweli Dlamini had not responded to Sunday World’s questions regarding the failure to repair crematoriums.
He said: “We are still awaiting feedback from the relevant department.” An Anglican priest in Daveyton, the Rev Edward Sithole, said: “We always have to be guided by the wishes of the dead. If they want cremation, we have to provide it. It is disheartening that some who die cannot have their wishes respected because of the poor services provided by the council.”
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