PROLONGED PAIN
Remains of the perished 45 will remain in SA for weeks
Grieving families of the 45 pilgrims that perished in a road accident in Limpopo, South Africa, will have to wait for weeks, or even months before they can bury and bid farewell to their loved ones.
It has been two weeks since the 45 Batswana died in a tragic accident, and it is still very hard to predict or even suggest when the dead bodies will be repatriated back home.
The accident occurred when a bus ferrying members of the Zion Christian Church (ZCC) to Moria for Easter pilgrimage fell off a bridge, crashed and caught fire. Authorities in South Africa have been busy at work trying to identify the bodies and assuring that they will be repatriated back to Botswana as soon as all processes have been completed. The process is said to be painstaking as some bodies had burned beyond recognition. Last week, reports indicated that South Africa Minister of Health Joe Paahla had told the media during a press conference that they had managed to positively identify nine bodies and are now in the process of post-mortem. The minister said they are working with Botswana government to repatriate the identifiable bodies. Unconfirmed reports suggested that repatriation of the nine identifiable bodies would happen last week. However, this week, authorities in Botswana had no update regarding repatriation of the nine bodies. Minister of Foreign Affairs Lemogang Kwape on Tuesday said they have not received any update from South
Africa. “Reports come in mostly from South Africa and it is important to deal with facts.
We will make an update regarding the accident on Wednesday, not about the dead bodies but the accident in general,” Kwape said. Spokesperson of Botswana Police Dipheko Motube also said they had not received any update from South Africa and will share once information is made available to them. Limpopo Health MEC Phophi Ramathuba has told the media that most of the bodies were physically damaged, meaning some are likely to have burnt to ashes while others got amputated during the crash. “This is why they have fewer body bags than the actual number of those that perished. The body bags contain mostly body parts and not necessarily whole dead bodies,” the Minister said.