Commissioner for Children report delayed due to Speaker’s appointment

Cape Town - Children’s rights organisation, Molo Songololo, has called on the office of the Western Cape Commissioner for Children to release the annual report for 2021/22, which has been delayed by some eight months.

The NPO has called on the commissioner to make the report public, so that progress and challenges in the report can be monitored, said Molo Songololo director, Patric Solomon.

“The Western Cape Commissioner for Children is a very historic process and institution that has been established.

“This is the first commissioner which has been appointed.

“It is a very historic process that is unfolding and therefore the annual report is so crucial, not only for the legislature and the premier, but also for civil society, children, children’s organisations and their representatives to see what has been done to roll out and properly establish the provincial commissioner for children.

“The commissioner is tasked by the Children’s Act to monitor and promote the rights and protection of children (in) the Western Cape.

“It is very crucial that we get this report timeously.

“Eight months already have passed since the second year ended of the commissioner being in office and we still have not received the report.

“We don’t know what progress has been made to establish the office of the commissioner as well as to implement the duties, objectives and responsibilities of the commissioner,” said Solomon.

Western Cape Commissioner for Children, Christina Nomdo, said the report had been ready “for a very long time already”.

“At the end of last year we were affected by the big challenges around the transition of the Speaker of Parliament and we (are) only just returning from recess.

“The report was in fact ready before the previous Speaker exited Parliament, but we have been at the behest of Parliament and had to wait to be approached by the Speaker’s office so we can have the report tabled in Parliament first before making it public.

“We had stakeholder workshops last year where this was also addressed and I gave a full account on what needs to happen.

“There is nothing sinister and nothing being hidden. We have published a great deal of the work we are doing online and to give the public insight to what the office is doing and we appreciate that Solomon is keeping the office accountable because people fought very hard for this office to come into being and the right people should be held accountable,” said Nomdo.

Cape Times