KUGOMPO CITY - A grieving family in KuGompo City was left waiting for hours beside the body of a 54-year-old relative who died on Thursday morning.
The ordeal has brought the Eastern Cape’s ongoing ambulance crisis into sharp focus.
The family said they made repeated attempts to get emergency medical assistance after Lionel Sharpe died, but their calls went unanswered.
For the deceased’s niece, Revel Lottering, the wait has compounded the family’s grief.
“My uncle died this morning, and we've been trying to phone the ambulance, but no one is responding; they always cut off.”
Lottering said the family first called for help at around 7am, but hours later the body was still inside the shack where he died.
“We are grieving as a family. How can a body be staying so long in a shack?”
She said the family fears the body is already beginning to deteriorate.
“It looks like he's starting to smell now, so we're asking for help.”
The family’s experience is not an isolated complaint.
Across the Eastern Cape, residents continue to raise concerns about being unable to access emergency medical services when they need them most.
Community activist Amanda Timms said she had been dealing with complaints about ambulance services for years, often becoming the person desperate residents turn to when official channels fail.
Timms said she receives dozens of complaints at times, including cases involving deaths, suicide and rape.
“For four years I've been battling with Metro. There's been cases where people have passed on, there's been cases of suicide, there's been cases of rape that I've been getting.”
She said even private ambulance services sometimes contact her because they are unable to reach Metro.
According to Timms, some of the most vulnerable residents have limited options when emergency services fail.
“Some of them don't have WhatsApp, they don't have money to phone 112, it's not going through. So I'm their last hope.”
Timms said she has repeatedly escalated complaints to authorities but believes her efforts to advocate for residents have made her unpopular with the service.
She said she has even been removed from Metro’s WhatsApp communication group after repeatedly raising complaints.
“I'm a nuisance to them because I keep on sending complaints through to them. I get like 30 complaints a day sometimes.”
But for Timms, the issue is not personal.
“I said to them, listen, it's not for me; I've got medical aid. I said it's for the innocent, the poor people; they can't afford it.”
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For the family in KuGompo City, those wider concerns have become painfully personal.
As they wait for assistance to collect their loved one’s body, their grief is compounded by a question that many residents continue to ask: Who do you turn to when the emergency service you need does not answer?