A ‘slap in the face’ for Struggle icons – thieves and vandals trample the sacred history of Soweto’s Avalon Cemetery

The Avalon Cemetery in Johannesburg is a historic landmark, the biggest cemetery in the country and final resting place for many of South Africa’s Struggle stalwarts and icons, including Hector Pieterson, Helen Joseph and Charlotte Maxeke. However, petty criminals have been stealing from, and vandalising, this gravesite – and others in Johannesburg – for years.