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Teenage parenting: Could Zuma be onto something?

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Lawrence Mduduzi Ndlovu is a Soweto-born Catholic cleric, lecturer, writer, poet and speaker, and arts enthusiast. He has written for Spotlight Africa, Daily Maverick, The Thinker, The Huffington Post, News24, The Southern Cross and The South African. He is a lecturer in the theology department at St Augustine College of South Africa. He is chairperson of the Choral Music Archive NPC, a trustee of the St Augustine Education Foundation Trust and an advisory council member of the Southern Cross Weekly. He was listed by the Mail & Guardian in the South African Top 200 Young South Africans list 2016. He is also the recipient of the 2016 Youth Trailblazer Award from the Gauteng provincial government.

The president has once again put his foot in his mouth. But, as insensitive and archaic as his remarks on teenage mothers were, it’s not worth throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Could there be a solution here, by providing education to teenage parents?

President Jacob Zuma has repeated controversial comments he made in 2009, when he said that teenage mothers should be separated from their babies and sent to faraway to places like Robben Island or elsewhere to study. Certainly that would be a bizarre and cruel act by government, regardless of the parent’s age, and there is also a conversation to be had about the fathers of the children – which the president did not really venture into. Often these fathers are older men who prey on younger girls, only to abandon them without any child support. As one Twitter user commented, all we need to do is take a deep breath and ignore what the president said.

However, the optimist in me would like to find the value in what President Zuma said to the House of Traditional Leaders; something we can work with in order to transform the lives of young parents and ultimately society.

It is always imperative that sound principles be upheld. No government or anyone can dispute that teenage parenthood is not ideal. If anything, this time should be part of their formative years, when they focus solely on themselves and growing to develop their purpose for their future contribution in society. They should be contemplating their studies, recreation and strengthening their personalities for future leadership, parenting and other decisions concerning their futures.

However, South Africa is far from the utopian ideal where families live in perfect homes with picket fences, or where children grow happily until they graduate, find jobs and get married. It is certainly not a place where the president always says and does the right thing at the right time. We may have the loftiest goals, and some of our ideals are possible, but it must be acknowledged that things fall apart sometimes in the most spectacular fashion.

For starters, child grants are necessary to provide the much-needed safety net for those – in some cases, teenagers – who find themselves supporting children without employment. Interestingly, the remarks made by President Zuma display, in a veiled manner, what should have been communicated from the beginning: that child grants should be transitory, or remedial, rather than operating on an extended basis – in some cases for over a decade. It is not untrue to point out that young parents should be returning to school, becoming skilled and educated, so that they can take care of their children and contribute to the economy. The issue, really, is the suggested separation of children from their parents.

If ever the Twitter user mentioned above were disregarded and we were in truth going to have a serious conversation about this issue, I would suggest that the child grant should be given if the teenage parent had proved that they were returning to school and that they were working to move out of the social grant system. This is important, because politicians often use the social grant system for bragging rights, as an achievement for government: providing services for its people. This is a very limited vision. It is not an achievement to have an unemployed workforce depending on social grants.

The fact that people should study or be assisted in finding a skill in order to take care of their children makes sense, and should form part of the plan of government. Inherent in the idea, however, is whether or not government can provide or create possibilities for employment.

This is where, also, President Zuma neglected to remember that South Africa has a serious unemployment problem. Last year StatsSA noted a rise in youth unemployment from 32.7 % to 36%. This means that the president has an obligation and duty to see to it that those who study and receive a skill also have opportunities for employment. Otherwise there is no point in insisting that people should study, if there will be no forum through which their study can help put food on the table. Even though it can be argued – and perhaps rightly so – that teenagers should not be pregnant to begin with, government still has the responsibility to see to it that those who fall through the cracks are assisted with getting back on their feet again.

Certainly there must be a willingness on the part of teenagers and unemployed parents to strive, with government, for a self-sufficient and peaceful society working towards the common good; and it is only through employment that those individuals can contribute to the growth of the economy by contributing taxes, investing and spending. Ultimately, this means that government will be able to cut back on social grants and be able to contribute in other areas like free education. But this striving will be a partnership.

It is a great shame that the president spoiled some sound ideas with his cruel and insensitive remarks about separating children from their parents. The very notion of free education comes from the same remarks that the president made in the National House of Traditional Leaders. In expounding his idea on sending teenage mothers to distant islands, he attached a small phrase that said that the state would fund the studies of these teenage mothers. This could have been the cause of great joy to many, to note that at least the idea of free education existed in the mind of those in government. It is a pity that it manifested itself amidst such worrisome remarks.

It is not enough to desire that all young people should study and be skilled for employment when so many young people do not have the monetary means needed to further their studies. There has been progress made with regards to free schools, but not enough has been done in the tertiary education arena. The National Student Financial Aid Scheme is taking strain and there have been demonstrations related to funding in universities like Tshwane University of Technology and Walter Sisulu University. This, really, is the area that President Zuma should have focused on. If he aims to achieve free education, then there are places where all young and old people who desire to change the direction of their lives can go with ease.

The president should also take care not to reduce parenting to just providing for the needs of the children. I want to believe that parenting involves material provision and also being present in the lives of children. Too many children will never want for anything – except a relationship with their parents, particularly their fathers. It is very clumsy to suggest separation between a mother and child, because no parent wants to miss any of his or her child’s growth, and no child should have to bear that.

With that said, I certainly think the idea of developing an education programme for persons who find themselves in such situations is necessary, and that is the best answer. I long to hear one day in the State of the Nation address the president declare that government has managed to provide a long-term way out of the social grant system by providing employment and education opportunities aplenty. That would invoke applause from even the toughest of critics. DM

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