THE City of Joburg is experiencing vandalism everywhere – and not even the dead can rest in peace.
People seem to have forgotten that graves are sacred to families who have laid their loved ones to rest.
This has changed as graveyards are being stripped and the dead are stripped of their dignity.
Since Olifantsvlei Cemetery was established in 2017 along the Golden Highway, criminals are doing as they please as the entire fence has been ripped off.
A relative who recently buried a loved one said the situation has left them questioning whether their loved ones are safe.
Smangele Msibi, who buried her sister in the cemetery about a year ago, told the People’s Paper that she is afraid of erecting a tombstone for her sister.
“If these people can steal fences, what will happen to newly erected tombstones?
“This situation makes me fearful.
“The next thing they will be vandalising the graves and exhuming bodies,” she said.
Cemetery manager Reggie Moloi told Daily Sun that the graveyard can take up to 800 000 graves and it goes across the Golden Highway, but that side has not yet been developed.
Moloi said that the issue of vandalism is a problem everywhere. and cemeteries are not spared.
“The people who do this don’t care whether it’s a cemetery or not,” he said.
“The plan is not to replace the fence with bricks.”
He said he was there on Monday to inspect the fence. He said the fence gets vandalised after hours.
“When you see people walking into the cemetery how do you question them on what they want at the cemetery. What if they say they are visiting their mother? It would look as if you are harassing people,” Moloi said.
Moloi mentioned that Olifantsvlei is no different to Avalon as the fence there is also gone.
“People are breaking the concrete fence looking for the steel inside the reinforcement,” he said.
Moloi said the city is now considering solid concrete walls to curb the vandalism happening in cemeteries.
