Tshwane to apologise over cemetery fiasco
The unhappiness caused by earth works performed at the Pretoria East Cememetary could see the Tshwane metro apologise to residents affected
Stephané Bothma
The metro is seeking to explain its “violation” of graves in the Pretoria East Cemetery and apologise to those affected.
It was in the process of arranging a meeting to this end, metro spokesman Selby Bokaba said.
The metro has neglected to inform families and friends that it was about to embark on a landscaping project in the cemetery that included extensive earthworks.
Bokaba said this week: “We do apologise for our insufficient communication with families whose loved ones are buried at the cemetery.”
He said once a meeting had been arranged, a formal apology would be issued to those affected and the complete rationale behind the project currently underway at one section of the cemetery.
But metro has denied desecrating of more than 600 graves during a landscaping project as public outrage was mounting over the issue.
Bokaba accused DA councillor Lex Middelberg of “callously” stirring up emotions to “score cheap political points” by claiming that the metro had desecrated graves in the cleaning operation.
Middelberg laid criminal charges on Thursday against the metro management, in particular against city manager Jason Ngobeni, after a front end loader had been sent into one section of the graveyard to do earthworks among gravestones.
The metro earlier said Pretoria East was a berm category cemetery which only allowed headstones to be erected and not burial plot markings.
Middelberg claimed that workers preparing for the planting of lawns and irrigation systems had obliterated graves.
They had damaged a number of tombstones and destroyed or removed some tombstones and shrines built and maintained by grieving city residents, he said.
“In addition numerous markers of graves that had not yet had a tombstone erected were simply scraped away‚ leaving numerous graves totally unmarked‚” he said.
The charges laid at the Garsfontein police station on Thursday morning involved the “violation of a grave”.
They centred on the way the workers had performed the work – showing no respect for a gravesite, Middelberg said.
He had not laid any charges of malicious damage to property.
On a visit to the graveyard, Rekord spoke to several upset, angry or tearful relatives.
Johan Breytenbach, who could not hold back the tears, said the headstone of his 17-year-old daughter Stefné had been destroyed by workers.
“I cannot believe what they have done. I do not have words. When I questioned the supervisor of the workers about Stefné’s gravestone, he just laughed and said ‘we are planting grass’,” a visibly emotional Breytenbach said.
Paula Theunissen, who also said her mother’s headstone had been damaged, said she planned on reporting the issue to the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights.
“If not for Rekord, I would not even have known that my mother’s grave had been destroyed, she said, vowing not to give up the fight against the metro.”
She had not been given any pre-notification that the metro intended to clear areas between tombstones and was heartbroken and devastated by the manner in which the work was carried out.
Rekord has been inundated with calls from people worried that their family members’ graves had been damaged.
Bokaba last week said he had personally gone to the gravesite and not a single grave had been destroyed.
He said gravesite valuables, such as crosses and other material used to mark the graves, had been removed and stored in the cemetery store room to make way for the installation of irrigation pipes and laying of lawn to beautify the cemetery.
He said the materials had been removed to protect them from being damaged during the installation of the irrigation system and that a notice had been put up at the entrance of the cemetery.
“I challenge the DA to prove their claim and show us one grave that has been destroyed. We understand it is an election season but using something sacrosanct as graves and shrines to garner votes borders on insanity‚” he said.
Middelberg stressed that the DA was not against the cleaning of the cemetery – which was long overdue – but about the insensitive and completely inhumane manner in which the work had been carried out.
“We are not laying charged of malicious damage to property, but of violation of a grave,” he said, explaining that the law clearly stated that any grave should be respected and that it should be treated in a dignified manner.
Solly Msimanga, DA mayoral candidate for Tshwane, who went to the cemetery for a meeting family members, said: “For the families it is like opening up old wounds again.”
Also read:
Uproar over ground work at cemetery
Do you have more information about the story? Please send us an email to editorial@rekord.co.za or phone us on 083 625 4114.
For free breaking and community news, visit Rekord’s websites:
For more news and interesting articles, like Rekord on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or Instagram.
- We have exciting news! We’re offering a free alert to help you always be in the loop. Send an email with the word ‘Subscribe’ to breakingnews@rekord.co.za to receive your free daily breaking news update.
