Kairos Centre: SA headed for mental health meltdown as another facility closes

The signboard outside the smallholding in Cullinan has been removed and half of the residents relocated as Kairos Centre, a mental health facility, prepares to close its doors.

The Citizen visited the centre after the Democratic Alliance said in a statement the centre was still operating illegally.

Mental health facility closing down

Manager at Kairos, Neil Wesselo, said only 40 of about 90 residents were left before the final closure at the end of June.

Most of the people at the centre were living with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and other personality disorders.

“Half of the people have been moved to centres in Atteridgeville and Hammanskraal,” he said. “The past two weeks have been a nightmare with the relocation of the residents.

“They want to know where they are being moved, but we only find out on the day the department sends the list of removals.”

Salary and patient care disputes

Wesselo said some people living at the centre have been there from the start.

“That’s what makes me so angry. Thirteen years ago, I decided I wanted to help people and started working here. Now it’s over and I don’t know what’s next,” he said.

He said the staff made the allegations of not being paid and negligence.

“But it’s nonsense. They even said the residents here only ate pap and samp. I don’t know where they got that, because they eat vegetables and meat daily.

“Before Covid, we had regular donations but after Covid, the donations just stopped.”

Families don’t visit

Wesselo said the residents had become like family and added an 80-year-old resident was one of the many there who called him father.

“About [the now deceased] Shane Jordaan. He ran away and his family only visited him twice over five years,” he said.

“He just wanted to see his parents, but they never came around. It breaks my heart when families don’t come to visit. Many families don’t come to visit.”

Wesselo said out of 100 residents, only four families would pitch up for the family day.

Doing the Lord’s work

The owner of Kairos, Susan van Niekerk, said she has made mistakes but gave the residents her all.

“We are waiting on the Lord to determine the way forward. Forty people are without work now, some of which lived in the area,” she said.

Van Niekerk started Kairos 13 years ago because the Lord told her to work with the needy.

“It breaks my heart. Some staff [members] have been threatening for two years to kick me out and take over Kairos and then followed the trouble with all sorts of accusations,” she said.

Van Niekerk said the residents at Kairos had nowhere else to go.

SA’s mental health meltdown

Ithemba Foundation founder Lizette Rabe said funds were needed to give the necessary support to the vulnerable in society.

“Mental health is such a specialised field, both on the level of psychological treatment as well as psychiatric treatment, that I do not know how any facility can operate without the necessary licensing from SA healthcare or governmental regulations,” she said.

Rabe said there were far too few state or private facilities available for all aspects of mental healthcare. “We are heading for a mental health meltdown, as we are a traumatised society.”

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