Some of the victims of the Life Esidimeni tragedy will need to wait even longer for the rest of their compensation.
The Gauteng government is preparing to head to court to ask for a curator to be put in charge of administering the claim payout process.
Almost 1,600 psychiatric patients were caught up in the scandal when they were moved from Life Esidimeni homes to ill-equipped and underfunded NGO’s in Gauteng in 2015.
At least 144 died – many in the most wretched of circumstances – left to starve.
The Health Department on Monday said the only payments still outstanding were for some survivors who were not part of the initial arbitration process.
Spokesperson Thabo Masebe said: “We want that money to be paid but we have to comply with the law. This is why we have to get a curator appointed, to approach the High Court and get the money.”
In March 2018, retired Deputy Chief Justice Dikgang Moseneke made a ruling at the arbitration hearing that each claimant receive around R1 million for the trauma and damages caused.
Edmund Omarge was assaulted when he was 19 years’ old – the attack left him brain-damaged.
Unable to look after his special needs, his family had to send him to Life Esidimeni – leaving his single mother, Maria Omarge, to provide for her unemployed children and grandchildren with her meagre pension money.
They are still waiting for the second half of their payout.
Life is tough for them and Omarge said often she didn’t even have transport money to visit her son at a care centre in Johannesburg.
“Sometimes I ask my cousins to take me to see him.”
Others have received their full payout – one of them is Victor Cloete – a schizophrenia patient who survived the traumatic experience.
His nephew, Andrew Pieterson, said Cloete’s life had improved significantly since the payout.
“His dream was to be in a plane and see the sea – so we did that for him – he was institutionalized when he was just 17.”
Pieterson said the number of visits by family members – most of whom are unemployed – had also increased drastically since the payout.
More than 100 other late claimants, like Omarge, can only hope that they too will finally receive all that is due to them.
-EWN
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