A packet of chips and an empty two-litre bottle of Sprite in a plastic bag are still there. A dirty, very dirty, greasy pair of jeans and a gold-coloured synthetic leather belt, as well as a light jacket the colour of which is no longer clear, are there, too.
Together with the red-and-white plastic tape used to cordon off a crime or accident scene, they are the only signs that a person died on this windswept pavement somewhere in Jozi. Next to the debris is a freshly crushed pigeon, with tyre marks on it.
An Adcock Ingram poster, used to cover a lifeless man’s face is still next to his clothes. If only the Panado, camphor cream and range of cough mixtures advertised had arrived in time for him, maybe this article would have never been written.
If he could read, one wonders what he would have made of the lamp-post looking down on him as he lay dying, inviting all to “save 1 000s [of rands, we assume] on 9ct gold jewellery”. All he needed was a little effort from those in the business of saving lives to spare his wretched one.
This is the site where Johannesburg’s most famous unknown man was found two weeks ago, the morning after paramedics refused to put him in their ambulance because he was too dirty, stinking and flea-ridden.
The paramedics face disciplinary measures for their inaction. There has been official and public uproar about their alleged lack of heart. But even as the outrage abates, he remains faceless and nameless. He is as anonymous in death as he was in life and is now officially known as Body 2 070.
“He was a guy who used to push trolleys to a recycling plant around here.” This is the most information security guard Ambrose Dudula could provide. Dudula witnessed Body 2 070’s last moments and the paramedics’ reluctance to take him on board.
All the police know is: “The body of a homeless man, believed to be in his mid-30s, was found at about 06:10 on Wednesday, September 22 2004 in Sydenham Street, Fordsburg”. Mid-30s? Dudula says he thought he was in his 50s; such was the toll of whatever pained him.
When a doctor finally saw him it was a state pathologist at the Hillbrow mortuary and the preliminary diagnosis was “the deceased died as a result of natural causes. No visible injuries were recorded, except for a rash over the shins on both legs. The man can also be described as 1,76m in height and weighed 65kg at the time of his death.”
How could it be that in a city of 3,2-million people (as Johannesburg’s official website informs us), nobody knew his name or whence he came? Surely someone knew him, even if only by his first name or nickname? What about the much-vaunted ubuntu? Or “Umunt’a kalahlwa [a person is never thrown away]”, we hear so many times?
In the Hillbrow morgue, Body 2 070’s plight is the same as that of the crushed pigeon next to where he drew his last breath.
For one homeless man, asked if he knew anything about Body 2 070, death is the ultimate equaliser: “All of us belong to the worm. You cannot take this piece of metal [pointing to a car] to your grave. In the grave we are all the same. Even if they dress you in a flashy suit, it does not help, because the worm will eat it and you.”
He is reluctant to give his name. It turns out to be a pattern. The homeless, it seems, are suspicious of sudden attention paid to them and are reluctant to share such details.
It is the same problem Dudula faced.
“When we asked him his name, you could see he wanted to speak. His lips moved but nothing came out. He was in pain because even when we tried to lift him up, he would grimace.
“Perhaps if there had been someone around who had known him when he was found dead, things would have been much easier. But as you know, as soon as there’s talk of trouble, people disappear.”
Armed with the knowledge that he made a living recycling cardboard and plastic bags, we trek to the three recycling depots within a 1km radius of where he died. The returns are scant. His face as it appeared in The Star is too blurred for other homeless people and staff at the depots to identify it.
“Maybe if he was someone who sold his things here, we would recognise him,” says one. “Don’t you have a better picture of him?” asks another. That is the snag. At each of the depots we are referred to the other two. “We trolley-pushers know each other. If he sold his stuff here, we would know him. I’m sure if you go to the other depot there will be people who know him.” They don’t.
A Department of Home Affairs official is amazed at the news that the police have sent the department Body 2 070’s fingerprints to establish whether he had an identity document and, if so, what it says.
“That’s really surprising. Think about it this way, what happens when police arrest someone and take their fingerprints? Do they take them to home affairs? No, they take them to their own offices to determine who they belong to. They should do the same in this case,” says the official.
In the meantime, police are preparing for the inevitability of performing yet another pauper’s funeral, unless someone comes to the Hillbrow morgue soon and gives a name to Body 2 070. And maybe restores his humanity.