The country’s burial industry is pleading with government to expedite relief for funeral parlours that were looted and vandalised during the recent violent unrest in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng.
The unrest has put additional pressure on an industry that is already battling to cope amid an escalation in deaths in the country due to COVID-19. One of the hardest hit is the Icebolethu Funeral group in KwaZulu-Natal which lost millions of rand after 22 of its branches were torched.
Funeral parlours massively affected by recent looting:
The group’s CEO, Nomfundo Mcoyi, “We would like to see the Department of Labour assisting us to be able to pay full salaries to our staff as the funds that we have are not enough. And also assist where other families cannot afford to do a funeral, we’ve seen in Phoenix more than 300 people are sitting at mortuaries, those families they don’t have money or insurance. They need to be assisted.”
The Funeral Federation of South African says many of these businesses may be forced to close down.
Chairperson of the Federation John Storom, “And for somebody like that could essentially mean the end of a business, the end of a livelihood and there is a number of things that could be required. Government needs to look at how they can step in and assist small funeral undertakers.”
