HOMELESS MAN LIVES AT GRAVEYARD

PIGG’S PEAK – The reality of having no place to call home has compelled a man to use his family graveyard as his ‘place of abode’.

Mciniseli Sikhosana chose to make his family graveyard his home after the umphakatsi allegedly repossessed his family land following the death of his parents.
Sikhosana (31) left the family home located in Mnyokane for a couple of years in pursuit of employment but upon his return, he found that he no longer had a home as the land, which had an old structure, had been given away to someone else.

Upon seeing that he had no another place to live, let alone call home, Sikhosana constructed a makeshift shelter using plastic bags next to his parental graves.
Sikhosana said there were seven graves near his makeshift structure.

“I feel safe here because I know that my father is with me,” he said. When Sikhosana was paid a visit at around 6am on Monday, he was found at the makeshift shelter within the graveyard. He said he had previously been living around Nkomazi with some relatives but a disagreement forced him out and he decided to come back to his parental home at Mnyokane.

“Since I knew that I had a parental homestead, I decided to return home,” he said.
He said he has been living at the graveyard since last Sunday.

Taboo

Sikhosana said under normal circumstances, he would never sleep at a graveyard of another family, stating that this would be viewed as being taboo.
He alleged the reason he was sleeping at the graveyard was that the place where his father once had a home now had a completely different house constructed there, with another family occupying the land.

Sikhosana said his father died in 2008 but that at the time, he could not return home to take over the land since he was unemployed.
He had left about a year or so earlier.
“I had to go away to look for employment,” said Sikhosana. He explained that he was the youngest child in his family and that by the time his father passed on, all his siblings had built their own homesteads.

He said they did not have any issues with him staying at their parental homestead. When he returned to the homestead recently, Sikhosana said he intended to build a house so that he could carry on with his life. Asked if he had a wife or children, Sikhosana said he had none but was quick to add that his girlfriend was pregnant.

He said this was one of the reasons he wanted to return to his parental home as he needed to have a place which his child could also call home.
Sikhosana said he was shocked that the local overseer, who represents the umphakatsi at Ekuvinjelweni did not want to entertain his request to be given back his family land or let alone be allocated a piece of land where he could build his home.

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