Today the story of Losanda resonates with me; he is the little boy many Johannesburg newspapers refer to as “the boy with no identity”. I find this statement crude because he is but a child in a situation that he did not ask for and does not understand.
He has no family and has been abandoned since he was a toddler by a mother looking for better opportunities and greener pastures. His infant years he has spent travelling from house to house and for the last two years he finds himself home with Lucy Sello a pensioner from Slovoville.
He has no birth certificate and the women who brought him to the outskirt of rural Guateng has been deceased for the last two year. No one knows the origin of the Xhosa-Sotho speaking little boy and government officials are refusing to give him a birth certificate or recognise him as a citizen of this country.
It saddens me that our South African social security system is failing him and the many other little boys and girls that are out there in similar situations. It anger me that our country can spend millions on political campaigns and lush street parties, leaving women like Lucy Sello destitute and fighting a system they had no hand in creating.
I have been fortunate to meet this Gogo and what a remarkable women she is, reminding Losanda that he is not a subject nor is he lost because her home and the little she has is his.
No comments:
Post a Comment