Africa-Press – Namibia. THOSE planning to cremate deceased loved ones during the festive season have to find alternative crematoriums or bury them as the Windhoek crematorium is currently undergoing maintenance and repair work.
The City of Windhoek last week issued a public notice confirming this.
It did not say how long the situation would last.
“Our technicians are hard at work, and we will update you as soon as the crematorium is back in operation,” the notice reads. Since the beginning of the year, 438 bodies have been cremated. Maintenance has affected five booked cremations, the city says. Windhoek-based funeral undertakers say the planned maintenance has not been communicated to them in time, which has caused them a lot of inconvenience.
They have now resorted to taking bodies to a private crematorium at Walvis Bay to be cremated.
Patrick van Wyk of Angel Funeral services at Windhoek says he had to rush bodies to Walvis Bay last Wednesday, and had to return early on Thursday to ensure his clients received their loved ones’ ashes in time. “It hit us like cold water that the machine is undergoing maintenance. They did not give us an indication of how long it would last either,” he says.
He wants to know how it is possible that all cremation ovens are out of order.
The City of Windhoek commissioned a new gas crematorium in 2018. “Imagine having someone’s body lying in a refrigerator and you do not know when the crematorium would be operational. People need to get closure within a quick time frame,” Van Wyk says. He says families now have to cremate their loved ones at Walvis Bay at an additional cost of N$2 000.
The alternative is to take the bodies to Upington in South Africa, which Van Wyk says is costly. Collin Brown of Eden Crematorium at Walvis Bay says he has assisted three clients since the announcement.
“Everyone will hold back to see what kind of solution they can come up with. But it will definitely bottleneck by Wednesday,” Brown says.
City of Windhoek spokesperson Harold Akwenye says both cremation machines in Windhoek are currently undergoing major maintenance.
He says the new sophisticated furnace has pending electrical and burner problems, which technical teams and external specialists have been working on.
“The process started months ago, however, due to its sophistication and the parts to be imported, we are still ironing out the procurement process.
“The old machine, with its aging infrastructure, had emergency masonry-related issues inside the furnace last week, which we immediately called in our technical team of experts for to investigate,” Akwenye says. He says the maintenance work cannot be rushed.
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