‘With cemetery full, Johfiyeh village residents have no place to bury dead’

AMMAN — Residents of Johfiyeh town in Irbid complained Wednesday that the village’s cemetery has run out of space to bury the dead. 

In interviews with The Jordan Times over the phone, several residents said the cemetery of the small northern village is too full to take in more graves, accusing authorities of failing to buy or allocate land for new burials. 

Um Ibrahim Talafha said the Awqaf Ministry owns a small piece of land near the village’s main mosque that can be used to solve the problem, which residents have been complaining about for nearly a year. 

The woman said that when residents dig new graves in the overcrowded graveyard, they sometimes find human bones.

Ahmad Qassem Telfah said residents have talked to the municipality several times to secure a new space that could be turned into a cemetery but to no avail. 

“The cemetery is too full and we have no place to bury our dead,” Telfah added, indicating that the plot of land near the mosque is the “quickest and most ideal solution to provide a new burial place” but the awqaf department of Irbid has refused this suggestion. 

Saleh Talafha described entering the cemetery as “painful” as people sometimes walk on the graves because it is too crowded. 

Johfiyeh is some 80 kilometres north of Amman and about 7.5km southwest of Irbid city. Its population is estimated at 4,000, according to Telfah. 

The village is part of Al Mazar Al Jadid Municipality. 

Mahmoud Hourani, mayor of Al Mazar Al Jadid, said the municipality has tried several times to find land that can be used as a cemetery. 

Hourani told The Jordan Times that a meeting will be held with the director of Al Mazar District on Sunday to discuss the problem and examine options to prepare a new cemetery. 

The awqaf department has refused to apportion the land for a new cemetery, the mayor said, adding that the best solution is to buy property for this purpose but the financial situation of the municipality is difficult. 

Irbid Awqaf Department Director Fayez Athamneh was not available to comment despite several attempts by The Jordan Times to reach him.