Candle-lighting ceremony held for Simon Phalama

Community members, family, and friends gathered near the corner of 6th Avenue and Joe Nhlanhla Street for a candle-lighting ceremony for Simon Sello Phalama on May 21.
The ceremony allowed his family and close friends to speak about the kind of person he was, and it gave others a chance to express their concerns regarding how he passed away.

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Many described him as a calm and meek person who would not hurt anyone. His family said his death came as a shock to them. Speaking at the ceremony, Dipuo Phalama, the deceased’s niece, tearfully told the community about the fateful night of her uncle’s death.
She said shortly after midnight on May 17, as she was sleeping in her room, her uncle’s wife and daughter came to her room and called her, claiming that her uncle had stabbed himself in the thigh. She recalled rushing to her uncle’s home, where she found him lying in a pool of blood and calling an ambulance.

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“When it arrived, the paramedics checked him and said he had passed away. I did not believe it. I said it is impossible,” she said, adding that she could not understand how her uncle could pass away just from a stab wound he had sustained on his thigh. She remembered how chaotic the night was, adding that it felt like a dream. “The person who has passed on was my one and only uncle, we do not have another uncle. Our hearts are broken. We still do not believe it yet, but maybe we will.”

Reflecting on her last memorable days with her uncle, Phalama said a week earlier, she was with her uncle and his family, and they were celebrating because he had bought a new TV. “We were happy.”

She said her family had lost a loved one, painfully noting that ‘it is what it is’. The ceremony ended with everyone holding their candles, singing and saying a prayer to console the family.

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