Doves builds funeral parlour in Beitbridge

DOVES Funeral Assurance, a subsidiary of Doves Holdings, has constructed a state of the art funeral parlour at Beitbridge District Hospital to improve service and cater for repatriation of bodies of Zimbabweans who die in South Africa.

The new parlour is 90 percent complete and will house a mortuary with a carrying capacity of 40 bodies, a chapel to accommodate 200 people, offices and a showroom.

Beitbridge Hospital is a referral centre for 120,000 people and caters for a daily transit population yet it relies on a mortuary which carries 30 bodies at any given time.

However, due to deaths emanating from road accidents on highways leading to both Harare and Bulawayo, the mortuary is perennially overwhelmed.

An average of 100 bodies of Zimbabweans are repatriated from South Africa for burial in the country on a monthly basis.

The major destinations are mainly Plumtree, Bulawayo, Tsholotsho, Nkayi, Gwanda, Beitbridge, Matobo and Zaka, Chiredzi, Mwenezi and Bikita in Masvingo province.

It is also understood that most of the people die in winter and the major causes are diseases such as Brancho pneumonia, Hepatitis B, Meningitis, Pulmonary TB, Pneumonia Hepatitis, HIV/AIDS and other retro-viral diseases.

Doves Holdings board chairman, Major General Engelbert Rugeje, said the 114-year-old business is currently investing in new parlours, buses, hearses, ambulances and funeral services equipment.

“The Beitbridge project is one of our capital investments and we expect the parlour to be operational in the next two months.

“This is a project that will help relief pressure at the local hospital and also cater for those bodies being repatriated from South Africa via Beitbridge border post, ” he said.

The organisation has acquired a new fleet of buses and 48 hearses which will soon be distributed across their branches in the country.