Dying without dignity

I read an article on Zim Online (SA) recently titled ‘Dying in Zimbabwe now a luxury only afforded by the rich’. In the article they state the following:

Harare, with about two million people, has three main cemeteries at Warren Park, Granville and Greendale as well as several smaller ones scattered across the city. Charges at all the burial grounds will, beginning January 2006, soar more than 20-fold from $750 000 to $8.5 million for the grave of an adult. A further hike is planned mid-year to leave the cost of a grave at $17 million.

The average take home pay of a worker in Zimbabwe is about $3 million per month meaning many will find it extremely hard to pay for a relative’s or their own grave. It is many times cheaper for one to cremate a deceased loved one.

But cremation is an alternative acceptable only to Zimbabwe’s minority Asian and white communities and not among the black segment of the population.

“We, black Zimbabweans do not believe in cremating our departed ones. Burning the bodies of dead relatives is simply not an option,” said Sekai Mapusa of Highfiled suburb, a mother of four who vowed she would never forgive her children if they were to cremate her dead body.

Two people very close to me have died in the past few months and I was personally involved in the trauma of helping to make funeral arrangements on both occasions, I think it important to clarify the statement made on cremation as it gives the impression that cremation is a viable alternative. The facts are, that it is not. The fact is too that we had few choices on how to deal with our loved one’s body.

One of my relatives was tragically killed in a work-related accident. He was far from home and his body was taken to the nearest big town which had a mortuary. We could not afford to transport the body home so decided that a burial in or around that town would be best. When trying to arrange this, we were told that all burial grounds were full. Even though it was not what we wanted, the next decision was cremation.

We were told that the facilities for the closest crematorium were not operational. A few days later and now in a desperate panic (not to mention mortuary fees which were now adding up as they charge by the day) we decided to take our relative’s body to Harare where we were told that a cremation would be possible there. In fact, it was not! There again, the crematorium was not operational - at that time we were told that they needed gas to cremate the bodies and gas was in short supply (and still is) in the country.

After days of begging and pleading with various people we were finally given permission to purchase burial ground in Granville Cemetery on the outskirts of Harare. The experience was too terrible for words. The graves were so close together that people attending my relative’s funeral were stumbling over the soil mounded on the grave next door. And there were so many funerals going on that we could barely hear the minister over the sound of other people crying. Seconds after the coffin was placed in the ground, the minister approached one of the family members and asked for a massive cash payment and a lift back to town as he had another service to attend to.

Are we so used to death in our country now that we have become insensitive to grief and how to bury our loved ones with dignity?

Having been through this a few months before, when another person close to us passed away we were a bit more educated on how to deal with things. His family knew what we had gone through and wanted to avoid the terribleness of a similar graveside experience. We advised his family to very quickly contact the crematorium in Bulawayo, as this was their closest option. Again, non-operational, due to no gas.

So the family got together and made arrangements to transport the body back to the rural areas. Raising the money for fuel was very difficult, and finding enough fuel was even harder! Two days later a relative left in the very early hours of the morning, to avoid the heat, with the coffin in the back of a buckie. The grave had been prepared by friends beforehand. By mid-morning the burial was complete.

Neither of us will never be able to tend to either of these graves. Shortly after our Granville ordeal, we were told about how the graves in that cemetary are routinely vandalised. Poverty has driven people in our country to desperate lengths. Apparently, coffins are dug up and the brass handles and fittings are removed and sold. In extreme cases, we were told that the whole coffin gets stolen and that the body is tossed back into the ground and covered over.

We have not been back for fear of what we may or may not find. We try to hold the memory of our loved one in our hearts, but the memory of that day and what might have happened afterwards haunts us all. And as for the rural area burial, there is no petrol in the country so no one can travel that distance. We rely on the kindness of others to make sure the grave is ok.

Just last week a friend told me that the Bulawayo crematorium was not working again. They were advised to use the crematorium at Gweru, some 200km away.

Technorati Tags: grave, cremation, funeral, burial, crematorium, Poverty, Zimbabwe

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