Home Affairs names and shames SA’s abandoned children

Child abandonment is a scourge in South Africa. As numbers soar, the battle is on to ensure that abandonment does not permanently define the lives of survivors. But those efforts are being severely hampered by the Department of Home Affairs’ decision to disclose to the public the abandonment status of some children. As a practice, it is shockingly callous, largely inaccurate and probably indefensible, so why is the department seemingly impervious to all of the concern?

There seems to be no end in sight to the abandonment crisis in South Africa. And, in the absence of long-term policy solutions, child protection practitioners aim at least to make it survivable, both physically and – for those who do stay alive – in its emotional aftermath.

To this end, they have dedicated huge amounts of time and skill to researching strategies for protecting children from the consequences of what may be the first event of their lives. While these solutions are complex, they are all predicated on maintaining the privacy of the child’s story until they are ready to face it and relate it to others.

Clearly these thinkers did not reckon on the Department of Home Affairs though. Like a school yard bully, the department seems determined to humiliate these vulnerable children by including an endorsement on their official identity document that broadcasts to the world in general that the child was “ABANDONED”.

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