The rights of mentally ill patients and their families were flagrantly violated and disregarded during the Life Esidimeni debacle‚ retired Deputy Chief Justice Dikgang Moseneke said in a scathing judgment yesterday. ‘All the facts here point to cruelty‚’ he said on the final day of arbitration hearings into the tragedy in which he said victims and their families had to be compensated.

'Families of the mental patients treated cruelly by government must each receive payments of R20 000 for their funeral expenses‚ R180 000 for shock and psychological trauma and R1m in constitutional damages,' he said, according to a TimesLIVE report.

Moseneke said although arbitration was unusual‚ it was intended to give closure to families and a chance to mourn and grieve. As a sign of respect the former Chief Justice read out the names of the victims of the marathon project. Mentally ill and vulnerable patients were stripped of their dignity‚ subjected to ‘torture’ at ill-equipped NGOs and abandoned by arrogant provincial health authorities who abused their power and lied about the scale of the catastrophe‚ he said.

The hearings were held after at least 144 psychiatric patients died after 1 711 mentally ill people were moved from Life Esidimeni homes into ill-equipped and underfunded NGOs in 2016 in Gauteng.

Moseneke said more than 1 400 of the patients had survived ‘torturous conditions’. Some of them had been transported on the back of trucks like cattle; others did not get medication and some appeared to have starved to death.

Moseneke said affected families were entitled to compensation for constitutional damages. ‘This is a matter of massive proportion‚’ he said. In addition to compensation for funeral expenses‚ shock and psychological trauma‚ he said claimants were entitled to R1m after their constitutional rights were violated.

The whereabouts of 44 patients remains unknown. Moseneke said he will donate all his arbitration fees to law schools.

Full TimesLIVE report