Emerging undertakers push for easing of regulations
The Unification Task Team (UTT) has called for home affairs to ease the requirements to obtain certificates of competency (COC) for emerging undertakers.
The certificates are key to obtaining designation numbers (DNS) by undertakers to practise.
On Tuesday, UTT marched to the home affairs department in Pretoria demanding the easing of requirements for COC.
UTT spokesperson Muzi Hlengwa said their members were unhappy because the department had reneged on an agreement taken in a meeting between the two parties last week.
“In good faith we agreed when the department said our members could operate for six months while the law was amended,” Hlengwa said.
“We were surprised a few days later when we received a memo stating that it would take 12 months to amend the law and that after the 12 months, our members should reapply to get the DNS.
“We can’t operate without these numbers and home affairs and the entire government know that we’re disadvantaged; we can’t work.”
Eastern Cape undertakers said they were not part of the march and would not get involved. The ENCA reported that tensions were high as the undertakers gathered outside home affairs head office demanding the department speed up the issuing of death certificates.
Police reportedly fired stun grenades at the protesting undertakers after meetings deadlocked. Hlengwa said several members were taken to hospital, but denied that they had started the scuffle.
Home affairs national spokesperson Thabo Mokgola referred the Dispatch to a statement posted on the department website on Monday.
In the statement, the department said it had granted provisional designation for funeral undertakers to temporarily register deaths to get (death) certificates.
“In an engagement with the team in Pretoria on 06 April, the department undertook to consult other stakeholders to seek their inputs in revising the regulations and implementation of issues related to the management of human remains.
“They agreed that the department of home affairs can issue a provisional designation for funeral undertakers to conduct their business for a period of 12 months, while the parties find a lasting solution,” reads the statement.
The department required undertakers to comply with the following: proof of a storage lease agreement for cold storage of the deceased with a facility issued with the certificate of competence; a certificate of competence of the person (lessor) leasing the premises, taking into account that the lessor may only lease premises with a valid COC.
The Funeral Industry Reformed Association called for regulatory laws that apply to all in the industry.
Spokesperson Johan Rousseau said COCS would remain a dispute until the laws regulating the industry were amended to address the existing gaps and challenges and implement solutions.
“The funeral industry needs a licensing body, a regulator and an ombudsman guided by a single all-inclusive law.
“We urge the government and all stakeholders to prevent a strike which aims to derail home affairs at the expense of business and the public in general,” Rousseau said.