‘They treated my brother worse than you treat a dog’
In June, Jaco Stols (51) sat doodling. Next to him was one of two well-loved teddy bears he called “Baba”.
“My sussie kom vandag [my sister is coming today],” he told Dianne Noyile, the head of a mental health organisation in Cullinan, near Pretoria, where he lived at the time.
Baba and Stols’s sister, Sandra de Villiers, were his two favourite things.
“I have two teddy bears. Every time I visited him, I gave him the clean one and took the other one home to wash,” De Villiers told Bhekisisa on the phone.
Stols often launched into the Afrikaans hymn As Hy Weer Kom ( When He Cometh) during their visits.
Born with a severe intellectual disability, Stols had the mental capacity of a 10-year-old. He spent 18 years at the state-run Cullinan Care and Rehabilitation Centre until he was relocated to Noyile’s small nongovernmental organisation, Siyabadinga, operating on the centre’s grounds, earlier this year. De Villiers was told the move was to make room for other patients on the centre’s 300-plus waiting list.
The centre may have been making room for new patients like 28-year-old Sizwe Hlatshwayo, who was one of about 2 000 longterm, state-funded mental health patients removed from privately run Life Esidimeni facilities in greater Johannesburg earlier this year. Their move followed the Gauteng health department’s decision to terminate its contract with the Life Healthcare private hospital group as part of “cost containment” measures.
Patients would be sent home or placed in the care of community-based NGOs. Civil society groups such as the South African Depression and Anxiety Group and the South African Society of Psychiatrists fiercely opposed the decision and several groups, including public-interest law organisation Section27, unsuccessfully sought a court interdict to halt some of the patient transfers.
At least 36 of the transferred patients have since died, according to Gauteng health MEC Qedani Mahlangu. This week, the Democratic Alliance claimed the number was as high as 60.
Hlatshwayo was transferred from Life Esidimeni to the Anchor Centre, which had taken over four wards on the Cullinan centre’s grounds alongside Siyabadinga. He died in September.
Stols was sent to Siyabadinga, only to be returned to the Cullinan Care and Rehabilitation Centre after the provincial health department discovered Siyabadinga was unlicensed.
Noyile says she had submitted paperwork to license the organisation. Mahlangu admits visiting Siyabadinga and the Anchor Centre before Siyabadinga was kicked off the Cullinan centre’s grounds. Mahlangu adds that the department had looked at Siyabadinga’s staffing levels as a model it could implement elsewhere prior to learning that the facility was unlicensed.
Bhekisisa asked Gauteng health department spokesperson Steve Mabona why the department did not know that Siyabadinga was unlicensed. He responded that the chief executive of the Cullinan Care and Rehabilitation Centre had been suspended as a result.
The Anchor Centre is no longer caring for patients.
Noyile says that at least three of about 70 patients transferred out of her care and back to the Cullinan centre have since died.
Stols’s health took a turn for the worse when he returned to the Cullinan centre. De Villiers took him to a private doctor, who found that he was dehydrated. The doctor also noted cuts and bruising on Stols, which were concerning enough to prompt him to compile a formal report.
The next month saw Stols in and out of Mamelodi Hospital. He was emaciated and struggled to breathe as his eyes fluttered and rolled back in his head. He no longer recognised his sister.
“A person who can’t stand up for himself, and they treated him like you don’t even treat a dog. I can’t accept this. It’s not right,” De Villiers said.
On October 28, cars arrived at the NG Kerk Rooihuiskraal, in Centurion near Pretoria, for Jaco Stols’s memorial service. He had died on October 14. Inside was a framed picture of Stols holding a giant teddy bear. Next to it was Baba, his favourite teddy bear. About 20 people — mostly family members — filled two pews.
Stols’s favourite Afrikaans hymn echoed through the building: As Hy weer kom, as Hy weer kom, kom haal Hy Sy pêrels ( When He cometh, when He cometh, to make up His jewels).
De Villiers sobbed as the pastor read aloud a tribute she had written to her brother: “How will I ever forget that little face when I came to visit and the smile and little hands that clapped with joy when they saw me? [You’ll] always stay like that [in our memories].
“Our hearts are raw and broken … [but] your pain and suffering are gone. One day, we’ll see each other again.”