Eskom relocates graves

ESKOM moved dozens of graves from a farm near Camden power station to a cemetery in Ermelo, Mpumalanga, without notifying families of the deceased.

The Saturday Star visited Ermelo and found 53 graves had been relocated to a cemetery on the outskirts of the town.

“In Loving Memory of: Camden Power Station Graves”, placards placed on the dirt graves read.

Eskom’s media relations department said: “Graves were removed because they were within the vicinity/footprint of the construction area for the new ash dam” at the power station.

Instead of the names of the deceased, the placards are numbered, and Eskom said that a “heritage specialist” could help family members identify which numbered grave held their relatives.

However, the site visit revealed that some of the graves had duplicate numbers, meaning they cannot be differentiated. Eskom admitted there “should be no duplication” and “we need to investigate”.

Members of the Khuthala Environmental Care Group, a civil society organisation in Ermelo, discovered the relocation, which began in late 2015 and seemed to have been completed in early 2016.

“The families need to know where their loved ones are,” Zethu Hlatshwayo, Khuthala’s spokesman, said.

The South African Heritage Resources Agency was involved in the reburial but did not respond to requests for comment.

The company that completed the exhumation and reburial, the Bela-Bela branch of Botswana Funeral Services Group, also declined to comment.

Vincent Mashinini, Khuthala’s coal campaigner, argued Eskom and the farmer on whose land it expanded the Camden operation made minimal effort to find families in an attempt to avoid paying the costs associated with reburial rituals.

“As a black man, there are rituals and customs that must be performed when reburying someone, especially one of your family members. In fact, it’s compulsory to be there so in the future you can identify their graves,” Mashinini said.