Anonymous is caught between the family his brother came from and the family his brother chose
Katlego Sekhu
Anonymous lost his brother suddenly while he was living and working in the Eastern Cape. The family is based in Johannesburg. The brother had relocated long before COVID, building a life there with his long-term partner. They were never married, but they had children together and had shared a home for years.
When he passed, both sides came forward with clarity about what should happen next. The family in Johannesburg were united: he had always said he wanted to be buried at home, next to his parents. However, his partner wanted to bury him in the Eastern Cape.
The family felt she was trying to keep him from them. She felt they were coming in to take over and erase her place in his life. If they insisted on taking him home to Johannesburg, she would not release the funeral cover payout.
The family pulled together their own money and pushed ahead. Now, when the noise has settled, Anonymous is left with a question he cannot shake. In fighting for his brother’s wishes, did they dishonour the life his brother had actually chosen?
“My brother passed away while working in another province. Our home is in the Eastern Cape, so we needed to bring him back. We honestly thought it would be as simple as just transporting his body home. We were not aware that we needed a certain kind of transportation.
“The family started making calls, a funeral date was set, and relatives were informed. On a Friday before the funeral, everything stopped. We encountered difficulties with transporting him across provinces because we only knew that there was a process that needed to be followed to move a body from one place to another. We only discovered this as we spoke to the undertaker, as we were asking them to drive the EC.
“Family members who had already started travelling all the way had to return; we incurred some financial losses from this whole process and preparation, as we now had to move the funeral dates due to the feedback from the undertaker. No one had mentioned in death that there were rules about how to move a body from one province to another. The funeral didn’t happen that weekend. To make matters worse, the family at home kept asking, When are we arriving – with the body. We ended up asking for donations to carry out this process.”
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