SUNGULA NKABINDE
THE DEPARTMENT of Social Development knew that several of the country’s old-age homes were death traps and fire hazards.
That was before 30 people perished when fire engulfed two separate Gauteng frail-care centres. But no one has been held accountable for failing to act on the findings of a safety audit report which highlighted problems at the old-age homes.
The report was presented to the department as early as February last year. It revealed that a number of care centres were not safe.
In June, 12 people died and 34 were injured in a fire at the Struisbult Care Centre, a home for the mentally challenged and the elderly in Springs.
In August last year, a fire at the Pieter Wessels Old Age Home in Nigel left 18 people dead and 84 in need of rescue.
The Nigel centre was identified in the report as a “high-risk residence that required urgent intervention”.
The Struisbult Care Centre was not part of the report, but a check on the facility by the Ekurhuleni Emergency Services done earlier this year found the home was not safe.
Ekurhuleni Emergency Services spokesman Roggers Mamaila said it was the owner’s responsibility to ensure that the home was safe.
“The notion that the fire department is wrong or didn’t do their job is nonsense,” he said.
He did, however, admit that Emergency Services had been due to give fire preparation and evacuation training before the fire at Struisbult, but this had not happened.
According to Mamaila, the Phomolong care centre – the NGO that ran the Struisbult facility – was informed on March 25 that the building was not safe to be occupied. It did not have working fire detectors or clearly demarcated escape routes, and some of the escape routes led to dead-ends.
But this is no consolation to the families of the deceased.
Nomsa Shabalala, the daughter of fire victim Nombulelo Majola, says: “I’m deeply saddened (by my mother’s passing) and there’s no point complaining, because it will not bring her back.”
Precious Mkhomazi was 28 and lived at the centre because she was mentally ill. Her mother Sinah wants to know why her daughter died such a gruesome death. “They haven’t given us any explanation as to what caused the fire,” she said.
Mamaila said that if the owners had followed Emergency Services’ instructions, fewer lives would have been lost in the fire.
“If the owners do not follow the recommendations within a month, we can shut a building down, but (where frail care centres are concerned), there are human rights issues… The people are often too old and frail to be put (out on) the street… what else can we do?” said Mamaila.
Ekurhuleni metro spokesman Zweli Dlamini said it was uncommon to shut down a frail-care centre.
“We only shut down premises as a matter of last resort. That is, only if the residents of that building are facing immediate danger, like uninsulated electrical wiring, for example… This was not the case with Phomolong,” said Dlamini, saying the metro would have evacuated the care centre if danger had been imminent.
Despite the building not meeting all safety requirements, Dlamini said it was unlikely that the cause of the the fire had been a result of the regulations not being complied with.
But he did not deny that fewer people would have died had the safety regulations been followed.
The investigation into the cause of the fire is continuing.
At the memorial service for victims of the Struisbult fire last month, Ekurhuleni mayor Mondli Gungubele lambasted centre managers for not acting despite warnings.
Social Development spokeswoman Lumka Oliphant denied that Ekurhuleni Emergency Services had inspected the centre before the fire.
She said that since the report, the department had appointed a team of monitors for all the centres, adding that some needed renovations.
However, the report indicated that fire precautions in many homes were inadequate because of a lack of funding required to upgrade or replace old equipment such as extinguishers, smoke alarms and sprinklers.
Orpheus Kubheka, the general manager of Phomolong, said he had found it difficult to run the centre with the money allocated to it.
The national co-ordinator of the South African Older Persons Forum, Roedolf Kay, agreed that funding was a major contributing factor in fire deaths, but did not accept this as a reasonable excuse.