MISSING CORPSE: FAMILY SENDS SOS

MANZINI - The family of the deceased woman, whose corpse has gone missing at The National Tuberculosis (TB) Hospital, is appealing to the public to help them find closure.

This request was made by the deceased’s first-born daughter, Angelina Edje.
Contrary to information from Ministry of Health officials, the deceased’s daughter said the missing corpse was of her mother, Gladness Kimoro Edje, who was aged 53.
In yesterday’s publication, it had been reported that a corpse of a male had gone missing at the hospital; however, the family has since corrected that and said the deceased was a female Tanzanian national, married to a former professor at the University of Eswatini, Luyengo Campus.

According to the family, their mother had been admitted to the Manzini Clinic last month; this was after she experienced COVID-19 symptoms.

Admission

Unfortunately, a day after her admission to the clinic, she succumbed to COVID-19-related complications. After passing on, it was gathered that her corpse was taken to the TB hospital, where it was kept for a few days before it was claimed by ‘unknown people’.
Impeccable sources disclosed that on the day her body was collected, on August 5, 2020, a group of males came to the hospital, claiming she was their relative. According to a death notice published leading to the discovery that the body was missing, a funeral advert was run in this publication, where acquaintances of the deceased were informed of her demise and that her memorial service was slated for Friday August 29, 2020 at the God’s Glory Ministry in Mbabane. The family disclosed that the memorial service was held at the aforementioned venue and the discovery that the corpse was missing was made when the body was to be taken to the Ngwane Park Cemetery, Manzini. An associate of the family claimed that everything had been prepared for the burial and they were shocked when they discovered that her corpse had already been released without their consent.

It was gathered that what was even more shocking to the family and acquaintances was that the body of the deceased was released to people they did not even know.
When clarity was sought on what might have happened from the husband of the deceased, he was overwhelmed by emotions and broke into tears. This was when Edje’s daughter, Angelina, appealed to the public to help the family find closure by sharing information that would lead to the discovery of their mother’s corpse. It was gathered that the deceased was a hard-working woman, as she was the owner of Sayuni Boutique, which was situated at Estel House in the hub of the country - Manzini. According to impeccable sources, the body of the deceased was collected on August 5, 2020 by a group of people who came to the hospital claiming that she was their relative. It is believed that the body of Gladness was brought to the morgue of the TB Hospital without a tag revealing her identity.

Bodies

It has been gathered that due to this fact and that bodies of people who succumb to COVID-19-related illnesses are wrapped in linen and placed in plastic bags to avoid infecting those who shall transport it to the morgue, the deceased’s sex was not known to the morgue’s personnel.
Instead, they claimed to have assumed that the corpse brought to them was of a male. As the body did not have a name tag, it was claimed that the its arrival at the morgue was not even captured in the register of bodies kept at the facility. The group of men who came to the hospital to claim the body are said to have informed the personnel that they wanted to cremate it given that ‘their relative’ had died from a COVID-19-related sickness.
When claiming the body, it was gathered that the people used popular names in Tanzania and did not hand over any identification to the authorities who were to release the body to them.

Also, due to the fact that the corpse was not captured in the morgue’s register, there was no paperwork filled in by the personnel at the morgue, save to release the body to the so-called relatives.

However, as days went by, Gladness’s family showed up over the past weekend at the hospital’s morgue seeking to collect the corpse of their loved one and lo and behold, there was no body to collect. This was said to have sent the administration and personnel of the hospital into panic mode as they immediately reported their predicament to members of the Royal Eswatini Police Service (REPS) in Manzini.

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