Moved by the plight of a mother whose baby almost starved to death, the Eastern Cape MEC for Social Development, Bukiwe Fanta, has intervened and helped 30 mothers secure birth certificates for their babies so that they can access the Child Support Grant. 

Shortly after being informed of the condition of the child, Fanta’s spokesperson, Busisiwe Jemsana-Mantashe, said the MEC was very concerned about the number of children with malnutrition in the province and about “the number of children that are not getting the Child Support Grant because they do not have birth certificates”.  

Fanta had promised to draw in all necessary government departments and sort out the issue. And she did.  

MEC for Social Development in the Eastern Cape Bukiwe Fanta. (Photo: Facebook)

Meanwhile the five-month-old, who had suffered from severe acute malnutrition and TB, has been discharged from hospital and moved to a place of safety. 

Glenda Brunette, who runs the Walmer Angel Project, said they were happy that the MEC had assisted the mothers with the documentation to access the child grant, but they would continue to assist with formula and baby food. Thanks to generous donations, the project was able to provide formula and baby food to 50 mothers who were undocumented and awaiting the Child Support Grant. 

Brunette said they were feeding more than 300 children a day at their soup kitchen and for many this was the only meal they would get. 

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Nomasomi Mbambo who, along with her sister Julia Mbambo helped identify the mothers who needed assistance from the SA Social Security Agency (Sassa) and the Department of Home Affairs, said there was universal relief and joy when the mothers received registration documents for their children.  

She said the project was ongoing and Home Affairs officials and Sassa officials were still trying to help as many mothers as possible.  

“Despite most people applying and receiving all necessary civil documents like birth certificates immediately at birth, identity documents upon reaching the age of 18 years, many of those living in marginalised areas of the Eastern Cape get into adulthood without IDs or other forms of documentation, even though they have citizenship rights,” said Jemsana-Mantashe. 

“This lack of identity documents is not only limited to the remote areas of the province… it is also a challenge that even… cities still grapple with, with women and children being some of the most affected.” 

In August 2022 in a submission to Treasury before the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement, the Children’s Institute provided devastating figures on child food poverty in South Africa.  

These include that child food poverty rates reached as high as 40%, the highest they had been since 2009 when the Social Relief of Distress (SRD) grant was first terminated at the end of April 2021.  

The 2021 poverty measure includes the permanent grants and the SRD, and shows some recovery in child poverty rates, but the poverty headcount

remained substantially higher than it was in the previous decade. 

At the time, the overall food poverty rate among children was 37% (four percentage points higher than in 2019) — nearly eight million children were living in households where the cost of basic food could not be met. 

The food poverty rates are substantially higher in the rural former homelands (54%), and in the provinces where they are located (for example, 53% of children in the Eastern Cape and 47% in Limpopo are food poor), the presentation read. 

Jemsana-Mantashe said Fanta had been briefed on the distribution of emergency food parcels by the Eastern Cape Social Development Department and that she was very disappointed after she was briefed on the reasons why the department was unable to spend R67-million of Social Relief of Distress money during the previous financial year.  

“The MEC is of the view that a department tasked with servicing the most vulnerable in our communities cannot be underspending on monies meant for them. As a result, she has requested that she is given monthly updates as far as the department’s spending is concerned. 

“As far as malnutrition is concerned, as the department, we have received a list of affected children. The households are being profiled in all affected districts. There is also a skills audit exercise that is currently being done for the mothers of the affected children. This is done so that they can be linked to skills development programmes by various stakeholders,” she said.  DM/MC