By Andrew Jackson | Operations Manager
Our UK based team recently had the pleasure and the heartache of visiting our projects around rural Bulawayo. Whilst there they were privileged to meet a family who have been going through significant hardship. With both parents having mental impairments the family has been surviving only with the support of the local community. The three children needed birth certification and the mother having lost her own documents then presented to the hospital but could not remember when she had given birth and their records could not be found. The two eldest, also living with mental impairment, have dropped out of primary school as a birth certificate is required for completing exams. With limited ability to earn the family has been doing odd jobs around the neighbourhood where some are very supportive however others have exploited them paying only $1 for washing clothes when the proper rate is $10. With the support of ZET and Trinity Project, the local Child Protection Committee, an ex-local councillor and other well-wishers we were able to secure birth certificates for all the family and the hope is that the youngest child will be the first in the family to complete primary school.
Our team also visited a community dialogue attended by around 40 women where issues of birth registration were discussed with a view to increasing uptake of this vital service. Even amongst the group in attendance over half the children there (brought along by mothers and grandmothers) were unregistered. A number of perceived challenges and misconceptions were addresses including issues as basic as; who is eligible to register a child, what happens when a parent has migrated to South Africa, what if a mother doesn’t have her own documents and under what circumstances can a grandparent register a child. From this community forum an action plan is created aiming at addressing issues and ensuring registration is treated as an essential part of life. Failure to do to so renders their children permanently vulnerable so is a message that communities must and do respond to.
We thank anyone who has kindly donated to help get our work this far.
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