The Eastern Cape health department has hit back at a traditional leader who claimed it had incurred the wrath of the ancestors by meddling in the circumcision ritual.
Contralesa provincial chairperson chief Mwelo Nonkonyana was quoted on Wednesday as saying the 18 circumcision-related deaths so far this summer season meant the department had ”dismally failed”.
Nonkonyana, who is also vice-president of the SA Football Association, said he believed the fatalities were a result of ”the wrath of ancestors”.
The department has for some years been fighting a running battle to get circumcision schools to adhere to minimum standards in a bid to reduce the number of fatalities.
Department spokesperson Sizwe Kupelo told the South African Press Association: ”We are very disappointed with his statements, which are actually taking us backwards.
”We hope people won’t listen to him.
”His comments are unacceptable and disappointing.”
He said Nonkonyana himself had been careful to select a circumcision school that complied with the department’s norms when his own son was circumcised.
Kupelo said there had so far this season been about 70 admissions to hospital, among them two partial amputations of the penis.
Fifteen people had been arrested for contravening the province’s circumcision legislation, 21 illegal schools closed down and 300 boys ”rescued” from illegal schools. – Sapa