The challenge experienced by orphans and child-headed families in Top Village, Mafikeng, North West Province

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The question, Is our political and religious leaders doing enough to deal with thisproblem of orphans and child-headed families in our country? However, in the NorthWest province the intervention of NGO's such as Tsibogang Christian Action Groupwhich was founded in 2002 with its headquarters in Lomanyaneng, Mafikeng play animportant role in assisting orphans and child-headed families. Tsibogang isinterdenominational organization, operating in the area of the Central District (NgakaMolema District Municipalities) of the North West Province.The newest project of Tsibogang Christian Action Group is Godisang Orphan CareProject. It runs a computerized data base with more than 1000 orphans and vulnerablechildren. They visit various homes in the villages, taking orphans and child- headedfamilies to Home Affairs to be registered for birth certificates, and assist those whoare older to apply for Identity documents and also start to apply for child social grants.There are currently 12,1million AIDS orphans in Sub-Saharan Africa alone equatingto 80% of the Worlds Children who have been orphaned by AIDS. This is too muchfor any society to cope with in traditional ways, let alone a society eroded by AIDS(http://www.orphansknowmore.com/the-statistics). However, the problem continuesto grow, by the year 2010 UNAIDS (2004) predicts orphan population in excess of25million in Sub-Saharan Africa. In South Africa there are 1.2million AIDS Orphansin 2005, (www.avert.org/aids orphans.htm) and 83 000 child-headed household.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University