Residents of Forest Village, Cape Town found three coffins dumped on the side of the road.
Lizo Cebani, who made the shocking discovery, said he was on his way to the shops on Wednesday, 18 August, when he saw the abandoned coffins.
“I was so shocked to see them and I had a lot of questions regarding how they got there in the first place.” Cebani said he then immediately alerted other residents.
“Kids were playing there and we don’t know if they didn’t catch anything while playing with the coffins,” he said.
Another resident said the city needed to punish the owner, because what they did was wrong and evil.
“How do we know if there were bodies in those coffins? What will happen to us?” asked the resident.
The owner of the coffins said he went to the dumping site earlier on Wednesday but was told not to dump coffins there.
“The people who took them from me after I came back said they were going to destroy them. They didn’t say anything about taking them back to where I was told not to dump them.”
The owner said after the coffins were found, he said he went back and collected them.
“They were coffins that had never been used before, but the new owners of my place didn’t want them, so I had to remove them,” he said.
MMC for water and waste Xanthea Limberg said the solid waste management by-law enforcement unit would class this as illegal and standard penalties for illegal dumping could be applied.
“Any person found to be dumping illegally is issued with a Section 56 written notice which carries a fine of up to R5 000 and the dumper may have his or her vehicles impounded, and impounded vehicles are also subject to a release fee of R8 426.”
Limberg said the resident should try and take photographs to submit with reports as this would allow for prosecution.
“Without evidence, it is not possible to convict offenders and if they don’t face consequences, they will likely continue to degrade the communities they dump in.”
