Over 300 funeral parlours to embark on a three-day strike
Cape Town - Over 300 funeral parlours are expected to embark on a three-day strike, starting today, shutting down funeral-related services across the country.
The Unification Task Team of the Funeral Industry (UTT) has vowed not to collect corpses, conduct burials or provide funeral supplies and has requested families to call the police to arrange for home removals.
The parlours demanded that outsourcing of mortuary facilities be legalised, called for the allocation of a Covid-19 relief fund for the Funeral Industry (UTT) and the abolition of the tender system in the funeral industry.
They also want municipality by-laws amended to accommodate the building of bulk or complex storages and for the government to introduce programmes to assist struggling funeral undertakers who were previously disadvantaged.
UTT national co-ordinator Thozamile Dladla said the funeral industry had been “reasonably” patient with the government.
“For many years, this industry has engaged government officials on different levels and spheres as far as industry regulations are concerned. But those noble efforts fell on deaf ears and economic transformation is still a dream. After all the back and forth, multiple meetings, extensive discussions, reaching out to the government, we absolutely have nothing to show apart from empty promises.
“The national shutdown will be well planned and executed to clearly demonstrate the industry's dissatisfaction towards the government. There’s no intention to vandalise and/or assault… however … we are warning those individuals and/or organisations who try to interfere, disrupt or stop the programme of the day that UTT will not guarantee their safety,” he said
Western Cape Muslim Undertakers Forum president Ebrahim Solomon said the forum was not supporting the shutdown. However, they were in solidarity with the other funeral parlours.
“As far as the Undertakers Forum and the Western Cape Funeral Federation is concerned, our demands with those suggested by the UTT are different. We will be in solidarity with them to get their demands off the ground but we will not be joining the shutdown because we have to bury as soon as possible,” Solomon said.
Cape Argus
Mon, 14 Sep 2020 09:40:52 GMTMthuthuzeli Ntseku
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