GUECKEDOU, 28 April 2015 (IRIN) – Forty-six-year-old Maurice Ouendeno stares silently at the arm of his blue plastic lawn chair. He waits a few minutes before beginning his story.

“They said we did not have the right to bury him,” he says, finally looking up. Sadness, mixed with a bit of anger, flashes briefly across his face. “We understood why, but it was painful. It was so painful not to be able to give him the send-off he deserved.”

His father, Tamba Lamine Ouendeno, died from Ebola on 26 March 2014 at the age of 73. He was one of the earliest confirmed victims: his death came just a day after the Guinean government declared the outbreak in four southeastern districts.

 

IRIN / 2015 / IRIN