Most people try not to go into graveyards but for some it's either sleep with the dead or face huge costs to get to work.
|||Cape Town - Most people try not to venture into graveyards after dark, but for desperate former residents of an informal settlement beside the Maitland Cemetery, it’s either sleep with the dead or face huge transport costs to get to work.
The 11 families who live in the cemetery aren’t keen to identify their actual “homes” because they fear eviction. But they’re more than happy to tell how they used to be among 89 families living in the adjacent Peace Accord Camp.
The City of Cape Town had leased the land from the Passenger Rail Agency of SA (Prasa) in 2007 to temporarily accommodate a group of families displaced by a fire under a Vanguard Drive bridge. And in April last year they were finally relocated to Bardale, in Mfuleni.
The city is attempting to move everyone in the Peace Accord Camp to make the land available for extending the graveyard.
But the residents who got new plots in Mfuleni say life there isn’t as good as they’d hoped. They’re not only struggling to integrate, but also struggle to find work.
So they say they had no choice but to move into the cemetery to get closer to work opportunities, without having to pay heavily for transport costs.
Belinda Walker, mayoral committee member for community services and special projects, says they know people are staying in the old churches and empty houses on the cemetery property, despite 24-hour security and locked entrances.
“Unfortunately, in a facility that size, with many dark areas and many points of access, it is impossible for this cemetery to be 100 percent secure,” she said, adding that if anyone was found in the cemetery after hours they were instructed to leave.
One man, who would only be identified as Mohammed, said he spent a few nights a week sleeping in the cemetery while doing odd jobs in the area.
“I do odd jobs like gardening and household repairs for some of the people in Maitland.
“I built up a relationship with them over the years, and depend on them for a regular income,” he said.
“But I can’t find work in Mfuleni, so I came back to my routine in Maitland a few months ago.”
He explained that it was too expensive to travel back and forth between Mfuleni and Maitland, which was why he chose to sleep in the cemetery.
“I work five days a week and spend the weekend in Mfuleni. If I travelled back and forth on a daily basis I would use all the money I earn for transport. Most nights aren’t too bad… I have things like blankets that my old neighbours hold on to for me during the day.
“But you can get sick very quickly if you don’t stay warm enough, or have some form of cover.”
The residents report that some of those who moved to Mfuleni have since sold their plots – illegally – and tried to move back to Maitland.
They’ve landed up trying to find a spot in other informal settlements in the area or moving into the cemetery.
A resident still living in Peace Accord said he often saw people in the cemetery late at night.
“You might get paranoid seeing things late at night in a graveyard, but we’ve lived here so long it doesn’t bother us. We know people sleep in the cemetery,” he said.
“Sometimes you can find them in bushes or the abandoned church.
“Some of them are the homeless or our old neighbours, and we sometimes take them in on rainy nights.”
He added that he was never going to be “bullied” into moving to Mfuleni.
“Those that went are trying to come back here because the conditions there are worse. The roof leaks when it rains here, our children get sick more often, but despite everything that is wrong here, it is better than what the city is offering by making us move to Mfuleni.
“They should either improve the conditions here, or find us a plot of land in Maitland so we can hold on to any form of work we have.”
Ernest Sonnenberg, acting mayoral committee member for human settlements, said they would continue negotiating with the residents in a bid to free up much-needed land for the graveyard to be extended.
“The sites for the 11 families are still being reserved (in Mfuleni), but cannot be left vacant indefinitely,” he said.
Of the Maitland land, he added: “The leased land site in Maitland is urgently needed for the expansion of Maitland cemetery due to the shortage of land for burial purposes.”
kowthar.solomons@inl.co.za
Weekend Argus