POLOKWANE – It was during his time studying at Unisa where he joined a programme called Street Law, reaching out to various communities and teaching them about the law and their rights.
Here, Chikane encountered many child-headed households and decided to act against the injustices he witnessed.
“You can understand the dynamics of a household where the oldest member is just 17 years old. We had to do something,” he said.
He added that they had to amend their policy as an organisation to assist child- and youth-headed households as some of the children who are older than 18 years and already considered adults, because of the responsibility, yet are in dire need to be assisted.
“The approach has been working with graduates and student social workers, auxiliary workers as well as psychology students and graduates. Those children are not only going through hard times in terms of material needs, they often need counselling and that’s what we aim to provide,” he said.
He added that the volunteers have been the backbone of the organisation as they have made intervention to households possible.
To assist the organisation, the public can donate clothes, toiletries, stationery and non-perishable foodstuffs which will be distributed to the various child-headed families.
The Roman Catholic Church on the corner of Biccard and Thabo Mbeki streets has been generous to allow the organisation to store the collections.
“They have given us storage space on a temporary basis, however, it would be nice if we could have permanent storage. This will help us have a place to put the donations in-between the distributions,” he said.
Willing to make a donation? Contact Mpho on 071 1800 200 or Thabang Morgan on 073 453 7291.
