dyton mupawaenda
Emmanuel Kafe-Check Point Desk
A CLOSELY-KNIT syndicate of rogue doctors, nurses, mortuary attendants and unregistered funeral parlours is running a death-for-profit scam at Parirenyatwa and Sally Mugabe Central hospitals.
Grieving families are being misled into paying high fees to shady funeral homes under the pretence that their loved ones’ bodies are being taken off-site — when in fact, the bodies never leave the hospital mortuary.
In return, hospital staff collect under-the-table kickbacks.
An undercover investigation by Check Point has unearthed a disturbing scheme involving medical staff at Parirenyatwa Group of Hospitals and Sally Mugabe Central Hospital, mortuary attendants and unregistered funeral parlours.
The cartel targets patients who die before being formally admitted into the hospital system — particularly those without funeral insurance or cover from established funeral homes.
The delay
In the usually quiet corridors of these two biggest referral public hospitals, a sinister business is thriving — and it preys on the pain and desperation of grieving families.
It begins with tragedy. A relative collapses at home; panicking family members call an ambulance.
Emergency medical technicians respond swiftly and do their job — stabilising the patient en route to the hospital.
There is hope. But on arrival, it fades quickly as the patient passes on.
Protocol dictates the body is moved to the hospital mortuary.
Instead, a mortuary attendant approaches the grieving relatives with a message:
“Our mortuary is for patients who die after admission or those brought in by the police and it is now full. You need to take the body elsewhere.”
Confused and distraught, the family is quickly introduced to a representative of a little-known funeral service.
These parlours park their hearses conspicuously near hospital gates.
They do not have refrigerated mortuaries or proper infrastructure. But they move fast.
A quotation is hastily drawn up, and the body is loaded into a makeshift hearse.
The family is told to meet later at the hospital police post to process documentation.
They assume the body is being taken to a funeral home. But that’s far from the truth.
The circle of deceit
What happens next is as shocking as it is calculated.
The funeral parlour hearse simply drives around the block — then re-enters the hospital grounds through a less conspicuous entrance and delivers the body right back into the hospital mortuary.
Behind the scenes, mortuary staff receive a cash kickback.
The funeral parlour, having paid its way, uses hospital facilities — including cold storage, embalming and body preparation — for a fee far lower than any private mortuary would charge.
All documentation is processed through hospital channels and preparations proceed smoothly.
When the family returns later to finalise arrangements, they are unaware that their loved one never left the hospital premises.
Posing as a grieving client whose grandmother had just passed away before admission at Parirenyatwa, I approached one of the suspected bogus funeral homes parked at the hospital’s main entrance.
After sharing my fabricated story with a representative, who introduced himself as Steven, he assured me they could help.
Without hesitation, he offered to contact “some of their doctor friends” to ensure my grandmother’s body was moved to the hospital mortuary — for a fee.
“I can arrange with our people inside to get the body into the mortuary, but we’ll collect it tomorrow. Our facility is in Mt Hampden,” Steven said boldly, confirming the illicit collaboration between the funeral home and hospital staff.
Grieving families are made to pay amounts ranging from US$150 and US$200 purportedly to have the bodies of their relatives to be sent to the fly-by-night funeral homes.
Exploitation
Hospital insiders who spoke to Check Point on condition of anonymity revealed that this corrupt syndicate has been operating for years.
“It’s an unspoken agreement,” said one mortuary attendant.
“If the family does not have funeral cover, they are pushed to the smaller guys. Everyone eats.”
Even some junior doctors and nurses are alleged to receive “referral fees” for directing families to specific funeral parlours.
The implications are dire.
Not only is the hospital staff profiting unofficially from unregistered businesses, but families are being manipulated during moments of acute grief.
These rogue parlours often operate outside Government regulations, compromising the dignity of the deceased and posing public health risks.
Check Point’s efforts to obtain an official statement from Sally Mugabe Central Hospital regarding the alleged illegal activities between hospital stuff and some funeral parlours have been met with a wall of silence.
Despite numerous attempts to engage with hospital management, our inquiries have been consistently stonewalled.
Initially, requests for comment were met with claims of being “busy”.
The hospital’s chief executive officer Dr Hopewell Mungani’s brief response was: “We are busy at the moment.”
Pressed for a more specific time frame for when a comment might be available, Dr Mungani said: I don’t know. Like I said, we are busy, maybe in the evening.”
Unaware
Contacted for comment, Parirenyatwa Group of Hospitals’ public relations officer Mr Tendayi Mautsi said while the hospital is unaware of any such illegal activities, an investigation has been launched to verify the claims.
“When a person dies at casualty, because our mortuary has limited capacity, we encourage the relatives to engage a service provider who will remove the now deceased and prepare them (for burial) outside Parirenyatwa premises. This is because of the space constrains we have with our mortuary.
“We have an obligation to take bodies that are brought in by the authorities. These often have a high number of unknown persons that can stay for long while trying to get their relatives. These, coupled with the in deceased patients make our mortuary often congested hence these measures,” he said.
He also said to ease congestion, they work with some of the registered funeral parlours.
“Having said that and in the spirit of wanting to ease congestion, we work with a team of registered funeral parlours that provide this service in order to ease the flow of bodies and also to provide convenience for the grieving relatives on sight.
“Those that pass away at Casualty are refereed to get assistance elsewhere. Now, whether this system is being abused is what we are going to unearth during our investigation,” he added.
Mr Muziwakhe Banda, a representative of the parlours operating at Parirenyatwa and the director of Angel Light Funerals, said while some unregistered funeral parlours attempt to encroach on their territory, they remain vigilant against entities seeking to tarnish their reputation.
He said they operate under a Memorandum of Understanding with the hospital.
“We are entirely official; operating with a clear MOU with the hospital. We are fully registered, with all necessary papers and documents in order across all our operating offices. Our documentation is complete and up to standard.
“We are not operating outside the bounds of regulations. However, we face unwarranted accusations of being unofficial or unregistered, which is simply untrue.”
Mr Banda suspects that larger funeral homes may be instigating some of these negative perceptions as legitimate, newer businesses like his expand their services to a broader clientele.
“It seems that the entry of new funeral parlours can be perceived as overwhelming the market, larger, more established parlours might feel threatened and seek ways to undermine our operations by making baseless accusations,” he added.
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