Nine-year-old cares for family
Nine share tiny Dimbaza zinc shack
NINE-year-old Thembeka* of Dimbaza is an intelligent, energetic pupil who excels in her studies.
Looking at her radiant smile, few would guess the heavy load upon her young shoulders.
When her appearance at school began to show frayed edges, her shoes tatty and clothes shabby, a caring teacher decided to take the 10km road to Thembeka’s home. She made a shocking discovery.
She found a tiny zinc shack filled with nine women, children and men, all in various stages of desperation.
The strongest and most responsible of them all was nine-year-old Thembeka.
Dimbaza has a cruel history. Under apartheid it was a notorious forced resettlement camp where children died in droves from malnutrition.
A Saturday Dispatch visit revealed that the family shack is only two by three metres.
It has no windows, radio or television.
It has two beds – one double and one single – for all nine inhabitants.
Most days Thembeka hardly has any food in her belly, which makes caring for her cousins aged 13, 7, 4 and 3 an extraordinary feat.
Thembeka also cares for her bedridden mother, an unemployed aunt and uncle and her asthmatic, deaf grandfather.
There are no wardrobes or chairs. The only table doubles as a family dinner table and homework desk for the children.
There is one wash basin and no privacy.
They all survive on one child support grant and her grandfather’s disability grant.
Only three children are enrolled at school. The 13-yearold suffers from a chronic heart condition which causes her feet and stomach to swell.
Shy Thembeka described her working day, saying she gets up before 6am.
“I wake up and heat the water and we all wash and dress. We then eat porridge and head off to school.
“It’s a long walk and I do get tired, but sometimes there are other kids from a neighbouring school walking with me, or some of the teachers give me a lift, which really helps.”
During the day, Thembeka’s aunt, Phumeza, goes door-to-door asking for a place to sleep for the night to lighten the load on the beds while her brother, Luyanda, looks for odd jobs.
They are seldom successful.
Teacher Magusha Msindo said it was a uniform donation by business people and former Dimbaza Primary School pupils that alerted the school to the family’s plight.
“We also managed to get a donation of a plastic sheet to cover the shack to protect them from the heavy rains we had last week and to try and keep the cold out,” said principal Malusi Manyela.
The plastic sheet has not done much to help the situation.
When the Saturday Dispatch arrived at the house yesterday, the entire family was sitting huddled on the two beds for warmth.
The icy wind outside blasted through many holes in the rusty zinc walls.
Thembeka’s mother, Nonkululeko, said tearfully from her bed: “Nothing is easy here. Nothing.”
“I can’t look for a job because I can’t walk. I have to hold on to objects to try and get around.”
When told of the family’s plight, social development spokesman Gcobani Maswana said social workers would be dispatched. — zisandan@dispatch.co.za
* Not her real name