ID saga for Mkanze family
"I am a woman, and I don't resemble a man. The home affairs officials accused my mother of assisting other people to get IDs and they claimed she was not my mother, but the mother to Thomas," she sobbed.
BURGERSFORT – Her dream of accessing tertiary education had been put on hold by the Department of Home Affairs, said Vinolia Mkanze (25) of Gamotodi Village.
According to Mkanze, she made numerous trips to home affairs offices in and around Limpopo to apply for an ID, but it had all been in vain.
Vinolia’s frustration with the Department of Home Affairs began in 2004 when she applied for an ID for the first time at Praktiseer when she was 16 years old.
“An official helped me and told me to make an enquiry after two months. When we returned, I was handed a certificate with the name ‘Thomas Mkanze’ on it. It had the same year I was born (1989) on, but the date and month of birth were different.
“I am a woman, and I don’t resemble a man. The home affairs officials accused my mother of assisting other people to get IDs and they claimed she was not my mother, but the mother to Thomas,” she sobbed.
She added that when she reapplied, they said they could not help her as she and Thomas were born in the same year. “They argued that my mother cannot have two babies born in the same year.”
Vinolia’s mother, Sani Mkanze said her daughter’s situation saddened her. She denied helping anyone to get an ID before. “I have three kids and they never had problems to get their IDs. My daughter is very intelligent, but home affairs has forced her to be unemployed. My relatives want to assist her to further her studies, but home affairs is her dream.”
Vinolia is suffering. Her two children cannot receive social grants because she has no ID.
“My life is going nowhere, my peers have completed their tertiary studies and are now working and am still forced to walk the streets. I’m like a foreigner in my own country,” she said.
A consultant from home affairs in Polokwane says Mkanze is now a late applicant. She would have to be interviewed to determine if she was indeed a South African citizen.
Steelburger/Lydenburg News tried to contact the spokesman for home affairs,Mr Thabo Mokgola, but his phone rang unanswered and at the time of going to print the paper did not receive his comment.
