Inadequate protection for young migrants who lack formal records
At least 80% of these children are undocumented‚ meaning access to education‚ health and child protection is easily blocked
She was just 13 years old when she crossed the border into SA with three siblings. Today Bahati* is in Grade 11‚ is the mother of a six-month-old baby and works as a cleaner at night. Yet she does not exist — there is no formal record kept of undocumented and unaccompanied migrant children who live in SA‚ or of those who enter the country almost daily. The lack of data on these children places them in danger as they go undetected by South African protection agencies. Their plight was highlighted at the Colloquium on Separated and Migrant Children in SA‚ which concluded in Gauteng on Thursday. It was initiated to try to find permanent and sustainable solutions to the problem. Bahati‚ and her siblings are among 109 cases of unaccompanied and separated foreign children in Cape Town. They formed part of research conducted by the Scalabrini Centre over the past two years. Bahati was born in Rwanda. Her parents fled to Mozambique when she was a baby. But after her father died and her moth...
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