WATCH: Statelessness rife among San community members Minister Kazembe Kazembe

Nqobile Tshili, Chronicle Reporter
National identity documents such as a birth certificate and a national identity card confirm an individual’s citizenship.

People who do not have such documents are considered stateless. According to international law, a stateless person is someone who is not legally recognised and does not enjoy citizenship of any country.

Mrs Rose Moyo, who is in her late 60s, is an example of such a stateless citizen.

Mrs Moyo is a San from Tsholotsho and has never had a birth certificate and an ID, meaning she cannot benefit from Government assistance programmes.

This is despite the fact that she is among the most deserving beneficiaries of such programmes given that most members of the San community are poor.

Mrs Moyo said lack of these important documents was a challenge not just to the present generation but even their forefathers did not have the documents.

The problem of Mrs Moyo and many others who were in the same predicament, is now a thing of the past after Government initiated a programme to ensure that all members of the San community get national documents.

On 13 September, the Registrar General’s Office will roll out a mobile national registration exercise for the San community.

Government says it has removed all the bottlenecks that have been inhibiting easy access to national documents such as asking applicants to bring witnesses.

On Thursday, Home Affairs and Cultural Heritage Minister Kazembe Kazembe visited the San community to consult them on challenges hindering them from accessing national documents.

Mrs Moyo speaking on behalf of the community, said many of them faced a lot of challenges when they tried to obtain the documents hence many of them did not have.

“We want to thank the Government for extending this programme to us. I have 10 children, some of them are as old as some of the men in front of me. Some of my children are married and are now mothers but they do not have birth certificates and IDs. We have our grandchildren who are in school, they also do not have birth certificates. My mother and father died without IDs so I could not obtain the same documents  and this problem was being passed from generation to generation,” said Mrs Moyo.

Mr Very Sibanda said accessing the national documents has been a big challenge for the San community.

“This is an important programme. It was difficult for the community to obtain national documents. Many of us could not travel to Tsholotsho Centre to obtain the documents and at times some individuals were obtaining the documents for other people’s chldren. It was now common for those without IDs to ask those with IDs to register their children under their name so some of the children are using neighbours’ surnames,” said Mr Sibanda.

Area councillor Cde Mexen Ndlovu said the San community was losing out on Government programmes because of lack of national documents.

“I want to express my gratitude for what the Government has done. Most of these people are always complaining that they are starving but due to lack of IDs it has been difficult to register them to receive food. Even the children who go to school don’t have birth certificates and most of them drop out of school when they reach Grade 7 as they will be required to have a birth certificate to register for examinations. These days some of them go to work in South Africa and Botswana but when they die in neighbouring countries it becomes difficult to repatriate their bodies,” said Cde Ndlovu.

Chief Siphoso, who was also part of the consultative meeting, urged the San community to take advantage of the registration exercise.

“You always say you want to be councillors but you could not register to contest the elections due to lack of IDs. This is your chance to get identity documents so that you can contest the elections and also register to vote. We want everyone to have obtained his or her ID by the time the mobile registration teams leave here,” said Chief Siphoso.-@nqotshili

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