Why Esidimeni patients are still at troubled NGO

The owner of the Masego Home for the Elderly‚ which is still housing three mentally ill patients from Life Esidimeni‚ despite the Gauteng Health Department's declaration that it would move them‚ said on Tuesday the patients had nowhere else to go.

"Since they were admitted to Life Esidimeni twenty or thirty years back‚ these patients’ relatives were never there. I was once a matron at Life Esidimeni and they are very good at tracing the users’ families. It is on record that they were transferred to us as patients and it is stated that no family members or relatives were found and it was also difficult for us to find people who were never there for these patients‚" said Maletsatsi Mokgojoa.

She was speaking to PowerFM on Tuesday afternoon.

The three were found at her facility by Randfontein police officers after the Democratic Alliance's Jack Bloom had opened a missing person's case to find them.

They were part of a group of 62 former Life Esidimeni patients who could not be traced since they were transferred from the facility to unlicensed non-governmental organisations.

The home they were found in was one of the homes that Health Ombudsman Professor Malegapuru Makgoba had recommended be closed following the deaths of some of the patients following their move.

The home‚ however‚ remains open. It was allowed to stay open after it appealed against the decision of the ombudsman.

Tribunal judge Bernard Ngoepe overturned the health ombudsman’s finding that patients had died in unlawful circumstances at Masego and another facility‚ the Takalani Home for Children.

Ngoepe said there was a lack of proof as to how patients had died.

“The transfer of patients was rushed and indeed described as chaotic. There are no postmortem reports. It is true that the environments were not ideal. But on the basis of the ombudsman’s report‚ it is not possible to conclusively say what the cause of the deaths was‚” his ruling read.

Mokgotjoa on Tuesday said the tribunal ruled that "most of the findings by the ombudsman were unfounded".

She lambasted the ombudsman‚ saying that he and his officials had failed to properly investigate her facility.

"He never came to Masego‚" Mokgojoa said.

She said while they were accused of starving some patients‚ this was not true as these patients were already in a dire condition when they arrived from Esidimeni.

Meanwhile‚ Makgoba's office refused to comment on the latest developments at the facility‚ saying the matter was now being handled by the Gauteng Department of Health.

Department spokesman‚ Lesemang Matuka told TimesLIVE that they were still looking into the matter and would comment once all the facts had been established.