Foundation donates coffins and shrouds to funeral agency

JAKARTA (JP): A local fund-raising foundation donated yesterday coffins and unbleached cotton used for shrouds to help the city's financially troubled nursing homes and funeral agency in burying dead bodies abandoned by relatives.

In a modest ceremony at the Jakarta Social Affairs Agency, the head of the Pelangi Foundation, Mrs. Handjojo Nitimihardjo, symbolically handed over 45 coffins and 310 pieces of unbleached cloth.

The coffins were donated to the city's funeral agency and the cloth to six of the city-owned nursing homes.

Mrs. Nitimihardjo, wife of the former chairman of Antara news agency, said the donation was intended to help the two parties which have experienced severe budget cuts during the crisis, including the allocation for abandoned and unclaimed bodies.

"We were surprised by news that the social service centers find it difficult these days to finance deceased residents' funerals," she said.

Head of the City Social Affairs Agency Emon Setia Sumantri, who witnessed the ceremony, admitted that it was a first for the city's social agencies to receive the unusual aid package. Its total value is about Rp 27 million, including other burial items such as cotton, camphor and perfume.

"This kind of donation is badly needed these days as we have no budget for the funeral of residents at all of our social service centers due to the prolonged economic turmoil," Emon said.

The city administration is responsible for 21 centers, home to thousands of abandoned babies, the mentally ill, sex workers undergoing rehabilitation and the elderly.

Emon confided he had not anticipated the problem developing.

"I therefore hope for more parties to be kind enough to contribute donations in the form of such funeral items," he said.

Acute economic problems, he said, meant the funeral agency was no longer able to provide assistance to the city's social service centers in financing the funerals, from bathing the corpse to burial, of deceased residents.

"They now can only help us with their ambulance," Emon said.

The six nursing homes that received the cloth from Pelangi were Panti Usada Mulia in Cengkareng, West Jakarta, Panti Sosial Tresna Werda "Bhakti Mulia 01" in Cipayung, East Jakarta, Panti Sosial Tresna Werda "Bhakti Mulia 02" in Kebon Kosong in Central Jakarta, Panti Sosial Tresna Werda "Bhakti Mulia 03" in Cengkareng, Panti Sosial Tresna Werda "Bhakti Mulia 04" in Kampung Gedong in East Jakarta, Panti Sosial Tresna Werda "Bhakti Mulia 05" in Jelambar, West Jakarta.

The Jakarta Post reported on July 20 that many of the city's social service centers were suffering serious financial problems, including funds allocated to cover the burial expenses of the patients, such as the purchase of the cloth for wrapping the remains and transportation of the corpses to the cemetery.

Head of Harapan Sentosa O3 in Jelambar, West Jakarta, Soleh Badaruddin, said the death of a resident would cost his center Rp 100,000.

"That amount means so much to us because it's half our daily budget," Soleh said. (ind)