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Nehawu strike negatively impacting funeral arrangements

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The National Funeral Practitioners Association of South Africa (Nafupa) says they are experiencing the ripple effect of the strike by National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu) members.

Nafupa president Julie Mbuthuma says there has been a go-slow and backlogs at government mortuaries across most parts of the country.

Mbuthuma says their clients are being forced to delay funeral preparations and that this leads to financial setbacks.

“We have got a go slow in most parts of the country, where mortuary staff haven’t been attending to the undertakers on time, or their families for that matter. There are even cases where a person dies, like more than 48 hours and we haven’t been able to do a removal because of the go slow,” says Mbuthuma.

Below is Mbuthuma’s full interview:

The Democratic Alliance (DA) in KwaZulu-Natal have laid criminal charges against Nehawu, alleging that their strike action resulted in the untimely death of a pregnant woman.

KwaZulu-Natal DA leader Francois Rodgers says, “What we did last week in light of Nehawu’s illegal strike and their intimidation, we wrote to the MEC of Health and gave them 72 hours before we open up a case against Nehawu … which never happened. So in light of that, we took it upon ourselves to go to SAPS and lay a charge. Because there have to be consequences, there has to be accountability. We can’t have unions having illegal strikes, infringe on the rights of law-abiding citizens.”

The video below is reporting more on the story:

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