Many disabled people in South Africa resort to begging to survive

From The Zimbabwean:

RUSTENBURG, South Africa -- The daily routine for Kingston Chimenya, a visually impaired 37-year-old man, has remained unchanged for more than two years now. (Pictured: A young boy uses humour to get spare change.)

Every morning he wakes up at around 6:30am. Together with his close friend Pedro (who is deaf and comes from Mozambique) Chimenya embarks on a 2km journey that takes him to the traffic lights at the corner of Klopper Street and Swartruggens Road – a very busy junction near the Rustenburg metropolitan area.

Poor living standards and an economic meltdown in his home country forced Chimenya to leave Zimbabwe and relocate here.

It is Friday and as the traffic lights turn red, the two friends spring into action. Hand in hand, they approach the windows of the cars nearest to them, with their outstretched white begging bowl a clear sign of their plight. Their third attempt yields the desired results as an elderly white lady, who has just bought a copy of a local weekly newspaper from an equally energetic vendor, gives the two some of her change.

The pair quickly scurries off the highway as the traffic lights change to green, before splitting the money between them. They wait for the lights to turn red once again, before resuming a routine that they only complete in the early hours of the evening.

It takes a considerable amount of time before Chimenya can be convinced to open up to ***The Zimbabwean. The interview is granted conditionally, it would not be longer than 20 minutes and there would be no pictures taken.

Communicating with Pedro is impossible as he speaks no English, however, it is evident that despite the two men being from different countries, they have struck a close bond. Theirs is a mutually beneficial partnership. Pedro is the eyes and Chimenya the ears.

During the interview, Chimenya reveals that he resorted to begging after his high hopes of securing a better livelihood in South Africa were dashed upon arrival.

“We do not like what we are doing because it is humiliating for us. But what can we do? Before we came here, we thought that life would be so much easier but this has not been entirely true.”

He says he can earn up to R50 a day from the generosity of motorists. Chimenya points out that while it is a well known fact that securing employment by any foreigner in South Africa is a difficult task, it is made more complicated if one happens to be physically handicapped.

“For a blind person the odds are immediately against you on the job market and it’s even worse being a foreigner. You have to compete with the able bodied and the chances are very slim,” said Chimenya, who was born blind.

It is difficult to fathom how Chimenya managed to travel all the way from his rural home in Nyanga to Rustenburg by himself.

“The good thing is that I have a passport. I was assisted along the way by people who feel sorry for me because of my disability. But if people would give us opportunities to make a proper living, we would not have to survive on begging,” he says.

Chimenya lives next door to Pedro in the informal settlement of Yizo Yizo, where he pays R250 a month on rent.

“Here there is no xenophobia so we are safe. We eat together as a way of cutting costs. The option of going home is out because I do not want to be a burden to my relatives and friends. I am not married, but I have a four-year old son who is living with my mother in Nyanga. I communicate with them from time to time,” he says.

Increase in beggars
Investigations by The Zimbabwean reveal that Zimbabweans constitute a high number of disabled foreign nationals who – after failing to get any employment – often resort to begging as a means of eking out a living on the hostile streets of South Africa.

However, unlike Kingston Chimenya, most of them are not willing to openly talk about their circumstances, as they fear that doing so would more likely to do more harm than good to their cause.

Rustenburg Local Municipality spokesperson, Butler Matlapeng, revealed that there had been an increase in the number of foreign beggars on the streets of the city and pointed out that the recently held World Cup could have attracted them to the area.

While Matlapeng confirmed that historically xenophobic attacks have virtually been non-existent in Rustenburg, he pointed out that “a study would have to be undertaken” to establish whether or not disabled foreigners had been forced to flee areas such as Cape Town and Johannesburg, where attacks of this nature have been reported.

“Yes, while we have always had beggars on our streets, especially from our neighbouring countries, we have noticed an upsurge in their numbers. The increase started just before the World Cup so maybe they were attracted by our host city status,” said Matlapeng.

He added that as a municipality, they tried everything within their power to assist as many disabled persons as they could by linking them with welfare organizations and making sure that foreigners got asylum papers.

“We do all we can to help them, but this is not our primary mandate because within government there are structures that deal with these things. We assist in writing referral letters to welfare organizations, NGOs and advising foreigners on how they can get the documentation that allows them to be in South Africa,” he added.

SA constitution
According to estimates, about 2 million South Africans are disabled. The South African constitution contains an extensive Bill of Rights which caters for disabled persons.

“Since the dawn of democracy, South Africa has, among other things, sought to establish itself as a caring society that protects the vulnerable and this includes the disabled people,” pointed out Deputy Home Affairs Minister Malusi Gigaba.

“This is enshrined both by the necessary legislation and by practical interventions by the government to better the lives of these people,” he added.

The freedom and rights expressed in chapter two of the South African constitution, cater for women, children and people living with disabilities, regardless of their nationality. But while asylum papers can go a long way in assisting foreigners living with disabilities such as Chimenya, the South African government’s inability or unwillingness to allocate a huge chunk of its financial resources towards the Department of Women Children and Persons with Disabilities can be a notable deterrent.

Traditionally, government organs dealing directly with crime, education, and health get a bigger slice of the cake and are often given priority over structures that oversee the welfare of people living with disabilities.

This year, hopes that disabled persons in South Africa would derive some sort of tangible benefit from the hosting of the World Cup seem to have been a pipedream.
Organizations such as the Association for the Physically Disabled (APD) believe that, given the South African government’s tendencies in the past, very few, if any, of the huge profits realized during the global football showcase would be used to improve the living standards of disabled persons.

State data made available to The Zimbabwean shows that since 1994 when South Africa achieved its independence, the ANC-led government has over the years largely failed to implement its policy of providing equal job opportunities to people living with disabilities.

During the 2009 North West State of the Province Address, the then premier of the province – Edna Molewa – admitted that the government was facing huge challenges to ensure that creating more jobs for the disabled goes beyond mere political rhetoric.

“Regarding employment equity for persons with disabilities more is certainly required from us. Of the target of 2 per cent we currently stand at 0.12 per cent. The job access provincial intervention strategy is being finalized to ensure that by the end of 2010 all our departments would have met this target,” said Molewa. “We have a mandate to ensure that we do not remain behind the goals and targets that we have set for ourselves as a government of the people.”