THUGS have now turned to stripping graveyards to make a little extra cash.
And it seems the historic Avalon Cemetery in Klipspruit West, Soweto will not be spared.
When Daily Sun visited the cemetery recently, the SunTeam noticed that most parts of the fence on the N12 side of the cemetery had been stripped, leaving just the pillars.
Residents were also seen using the gaps in between the pillars to enter the cemetery instead of using the main entrance.
Avalon is one of the largest graveyards in South Africa and was opened in 1972 during the height of apartheid as a graveyard exclusively for black people. It is filled with more 300 000 graves and is a final resting place for many victims of apartheid.
It is also the final resting place of many struggle heroes including Joe Slovo, Lilian Ngoyi and Helen Joseph.
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On Tuesday, 19 September, Joburg Mayor Kabelo Gwamanda proposed that he also be buried at Avalon. But he also raised concern over the vandalism at graveyards.
“The concerns that have been raised about vandalism is a responsibility that we need to look at in the immediate future. One of the disperses we have is that our history is titled as a heritage, it is an extending factor to who we are as South Africa,” he said.
“Avalon Cemetery is a host of heroes of the liberation struggle such as Joe Slovo, Tsietsi Mashinini, Hector Pietersen and other victims of the June 16 student uprising. Ove the years this was a scene of mass political funerals which captured the attention of the country."
Community Development MMC Lubabalo Magwentshu said the vandalism is done by people on the ground.
“If you go around Avalon Cemetery, the outside fence is not there. It is the people who have done that,” he said.
Magwentshu appealed to people to stop vandalism and to work with them.
