Joburg calls for help to protect city cemeteries from vandals

Johannesburg City Parks and Zoo (JCPZ) has called for a collective effort to prevent criminal activity from continuing in the city's cemeteries.

This is after the ash walls around the crematorium at the Braamfontein Cemetery were  vandalised this week.

In a statement, the JCPZ said it needed to join forces with the city's police, metro police, department of social development, JCPZ park rangers, security companies and community groups in these efforts. 

It said it was saddened by the vandalism. 

“JCPZ, as the custodian of green open spaces including cemeteries in the City of Joburg, is saddened by the extensive damage and desecration of the Braamfontein Cemetery by ongoing acts of vandalism,” said JCPZ media relations officer Noeleen Mattera.

The horrific situation of stripped placards and spilt ashes was highlighted by a community member, Sarah Welham, who said she was shocked by what she found. 

Welham, founder of the Friends of Cemeteries organisation, told  TimesLIVE that the cemetery that was established in the 1930s had never seen such destruction.

“I had brought somebody from America who wanted to take her father’s ashes back with her, and on the wall that his ashes were in, all the tiles and plaques had been taken off,” she said.

Meanwhile, Mattera said JCPZ is engaging various stakeholders to find immediate solutions to prevent vandalism from recurring.

“We are also looking at long-term solutions such as the relocation of displaced people living in the Braamfontein cemeteries and other cemeteries across the city, into shelters and alternative housing,” said Mattera.

Mattera stressed that vandalism was a global phenomenon and has proven to be a difficult issue to address.

“The extent of the reported vandalism at the Braamfontein cemetery, which by far is the worst damage in a single cemetery, has not yet been determined. This cemetery holds the remains of loved ones from as early as the 1800s,” she said.

The cemetery also houses the memorial of Enoch Mankayi Sontonga, the composer of South Africa’s national anthem, Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika, who died in 1905. Valliammai and Nagappen, early martyrs of Mahatma Gandhi’s passive resistance movement, are also buried there, according to the city's website. 

City Parks has called on family members whose loved ones were laid to rest in the cemetery, to visit the Braamfontein cemetery to ascertain whether any damage has been inflicted on their loved ones’ tombstones and to report it to the relevant police station.  

​“We are saddened by the state of the facility and the emotional distress it brings families. We are calling on the media fraternity, Friends of Cemeteries and interested organisations to assist in negating the indignity and pain caused by these acts of vandalism and the effect they have on people,” Mattera said. 

TimesLIVE

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