City Mortuary to launch private wing for rich Kenyans
City Mortuary in Nairobi.
The Nairobi County government has announced plans to launch a private wing at the 67-year-old City Mortuary in a bid to compete with other private funeral homes that have taken control of the high-end clientele.
The private wing will be equipped with a customer service department for customer relations and ultramodern cooling facilities that can handle 24 bodies at the same time.
It will also have a chapel as well as other funeral services such as hearses and body-lowering gears.
According to Tom Nyakaba, the Public Health Chief Officer, the intervention by the county government is part of the efforts by the administration of Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja to restore dignity in the public services sector.
"Together with Chief Officer of health facilities Geoffrey Mosiria, we have engaged a contractor to ensure all coolers are repaired and restored to excellent working condition to give proper and dignified services to Nairobians who have lost their loved ones. Under Mr Sakaja's leadership, we will ensure those who have lost their loved ones are treated with respect as a mark of last respect,” Mr Nyakaba said.
The county will also deploy five customer representatives and 10 security officers to serve city residents who will visit the facility.
The City Mortuary located at the junction of Ngong’Road and Mbagathi Way is one of the biggest facilities in the East Africa region.
Decent sendoff
It has six coolers that can store 200 bodies at once.
Over the years, a huge number of residents flocked to the facility to give their relatives and friends a decent sendoff but the number of bodies at the morgue has decreased over the years.
On average, the mortuary currently receives five bodies in a day as compared to the 30 bodies in the past.
This has been attributed to the emergence of private mortuaries with most residents preferring them due to their attractive services.
There are also a large number of bodies that lie unclaimed at the mortuary thereby eating into its revenues.
In January this year, the Nairobi City County government disposed of 292 unclaimed bodies at different county mortuaries in Nairobi with 214 of the bodies lying at the City Mortuary.
With a population of about 5 million, the demand for funeral services has been rising over the years.
A number of private funeral homes such as Lee Funeral Home, Chiromo Funeral Parlour run by the University of Nairobi, Zion Funeral Services, Montezuma Monalisa Funeral Homes, Kenyatta University Funeral Home, Lona Funeral Services, Umash Funeral Home have invested heavily in the industry.
