Childline Lim has come a long way over 10 years

POLOKWANE – Childline Limpopo this year celebrates 10 years of helping and assisting children and families who are caught in different kinds of abuse.

Childline Limpopo works daily on cases of physical, emotional and sexual abuse, family relationships, behavioural problems, poverty, school problems, child neglect, legal issue and many more.

Director of Childline Limpopo, Priscilla Molaudzi, said there was a high rate of child abuse and Childline was recognised by government 10 years ago as being capable of assisting victims by means of toll free telephone calls to Childline.

“Childline Limpopo was the eighth Childline in South Africa. We started small, operating for eight hours in 2005 until 2007. In February 2010 a second line was installed and we started operating 24 hours. We have three shifts per day which are: 07:00 until 12:00, 12:00 until 17:00 and 17:00 until 07:00 and each shift has two counsellors,” Molaudzi said.

Two more lines had been installed, but the toll free function still had to be activated. Childline Limpopo started with Molaudzi being the only employee, but over the years grew to 98 employees and five sub-offices.

These included:

• Vhembe based in Thohoyandou since October 2010.

• Modimolle based in Phagameng since October 2011.

• Thabazimbi based in Regorogile since February 2013.

According to Molaudzi, Childline Limpopo faced a lot of challenges, with finances being at the top of the list.

“Funding is a major challenge for Childline Limpopo. It has 45 full-time staff whereby only one position is funded by government. Funding from non-government organisations (private sector) has deteriorated over the years, which threatens the existence of Childline Limpopo as well as the child protection services. Resources are also scarce. We would appreciate it if the companies in Polokwane could donate any new or old furniture,” Molaudzi said.

She added that 21 interns, eight social workers, 11 community development workers and an IT administrator, had been placed with Childline since May 2015 but they did not have resources such as computers, tables or chairs.

“We plead with companies to assist us by donating office furniture, equipment like usable computers if not new, payment of the monthly rental, payment of petrol to allow us to reach children in need of care and support, and payment of the monthly telephone bill,” Molaudzi said.

Services offered by Childline Limpopo are as follows:

• Crisis Line, 080 00 55 555, the core service which serves all children through telephone counselling. It operates 24 hours.

• Psycho-social support services, which is a social worker service that provide therapy for children, families and schools where children need counselling or trauma debriefing.

• Education and prevention, which focuses on school life-skills programmes as well as training for teachers and crèches on child abuse and identification, its impact and how to deal with a child who has disclosed.

Childline Limpopo is based at 17 Hans van Rensburg Street or can be contacted at (015) 295 6449.

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