Gauteng concludes payment of almost R160m to Life Esidimeni claimants

THE Gauteng executive council has settled the multimillion-rand financial claim linked to the Life Esidimeni tragedy.

Retired Deputy Chief Justice Dikgang Moseneke earlier this year ordered the government to compensate the families of the victims who died in the tragedy.

“The Office of the Premier paid a total sum of R159.46-million to all the 134 claimants who were part of the alternative dispute resolution process,” Gauteng premier David Makhura’s office said yesterday.

“All payments were concluded by June 13, ahead of the deadline of June 19.”

Moseneke’s probe into the Esidimeni tragedy concluded that the rights of mentally ill patients and their families were flagrantly violated and disregarded during the debacle.

“All the facts here point to cruelty‚” he said on the final day of arbitration hearings into the tragedy‚ in which he said victims and their families had to be compensated.

Moseneke ruled that families of the mental patients treated cruelly by the government should each receive payments of R20 000 for funeral expenses‚ R180 000 for shock and psychological trauma, and R1-million in constitutional damages.

Moseneke said that although arbitration was unusual‚ it was intended to give closure to families and a chance to mourn and grieve.

Mentally ill and vulnerable patients were stripped of their dignity‚ subjected to torture at ill-equipped NGOs and abandoned by arrogant provincial health authorities who abused their power and lied about the scale of the catastrophe‚ he said.

At least 144 psychiatric patients died after 1 711 were moved from Life Esidimeni homes into ill-equipped and underfunded NGOs in 2016 in Gauteng.

Last month, the DA said 28 patients had still not been located. – TimesLIVE