Challenges Wiphan Children Face…from Abby
This Blog entry was written by Abby, Kunda’s daughter…
Many, if not all of these orphans, come from under privileged communities. And when they go to a community school, it is likely that they are going to school for the very first time, regardless how old they are. So when asked about their ages, they simply do not know. The reason why the children do not know their dates of birth is simple…many of them were never told.
The orphaned children might have lost their parents at a very young age so they have no way of knowing what-so-ever when their parents died or how old they where and so they might have a year in mind, except no exact dates of when they were born. As it is at now in Zambia, the government does not have any program that takes care of orphaned children. And so when children are orphaned it is up to relatives of the deceased parents to take care of them (if the relatives are willing that is or if there are any relatives at all). So when there is no relative willing to take in children when they are orphaned, these children are on their own. They start living on the streets, because they have no shelter. They start fending for themselves and life for them is about surviving. For young girls, they are forced to get married. They do not care how old they are, that’s if they ever knew how old they were. When and if they get a chance to be in school, they have no knowledge of how old they are at all.
In some situations, some orphans are fortunate enough to be taken in by relatives. These, however, are not their parents and they don’t bother, or even think it is their responsibility to find out anything about these children. For them, taking care of these children is help enough that they don’t want to go looking for information like birth certificates especially when they haven’t found any use for such information and so again. They don’t know care to remember when the children were orphaned even though it is likely that they might have a year in mind so it is all about making estimations at the end of the day.
For some children that are single orphans living with either their mothers or fathers, it is not the fault of the child at all. The parent does not know or even care to remember when their own child was born. Most of such parents are those that have never had an education. They have not known how important it is to know or be aware of one’s own age. What happens in Zambia is when someone is born, they are given a temporary certificate of birth. So it is then up to the parents of that child to purse an original certificate of birth later on. It is a long process and so when a parent doesn’t understand the importance of the certificate they simply do not follow through on the permanent certificate.
Wiphan is working hard to try to provide support for these children and caretakers. Wiphan’s role in these communities has already created positive and necessary change.
Abigail for Wiphan