Badisa SUPPOSED to protect children`s rights ...

Please refer to an email sent to both the offices of Badisa as well as the South African Council of Social Services Professions on which I have had absolutely NO response whatsoever. I find it ridiculous as children`s lives are being torn apart!!

Good day to all

I firstly would to state from the outset that the contents of this email is my official complaint relating to the irregularities that transpired at your GEORGE OFFICE on Monday last week and again on Monday this week.

The issue on hand is the fact that your assistant social worker informed the mother mentioned here below not to give her children back to the Principal Caregiver even though there was a specific agreement in place and the Principal Caregiver had been looking after the children for most of the past 4 years and informed the mother that she has the full right to remove the children from the caregiver without any form of investigation or due process. The well being of the children was never considered only that of the mother however what makes matters worse is the fact that the children who are 5 years old and 7 years old respectively were even interviewed by the assistant in the company of the mother and this is totally against any protocol that I am aware of. The sole reason for the mother abducting her children was because I had asked her to contribute towards their upkeep in the same manner that the biological father does on a monthly basis.

I would like to start my complaint by mentioning the mission statement of Badisa below (copied from your website)

Children and Families Badisa’s services to children and families are in line with the strategies in the National Development Plan 2030 and the policies of the Department of Social Development, which are to: • Promote and strengthen healthy family life. • Contribute towards all families, vulnerable children and the youth’s sense of safety. • Enhance a sense of community, social cohesion and social inclusion. • Alleviate poverty. • Enhance family members’ opportunities to enter the job market. • Provide an infrastructure for child protection. • Mitigate risk factors in families through collaboration with internal and external service providers. Badisa delivers a continuum of services to protect children and strengthen family life. These services include prevention and early intervention services, statutory and re-uniting services.

The content of my complaint

Background

My son and his girlfriend came to live with me in July 2012, 3 months after their baby boy was born and this was the start of my wonderful journey as the PRIMARY CARE GIVER for my grandchildren. They had a very unstable relationship and to make matters worse, the mother who at the time was unemployed had absolutely no idea of how to look after her child resulting in numerous arguments between her, my son and myself.

They resided with me until August 2013 where after they moved into their own place. I begged the mother on numerous occasions not to fall pregnant but she ignored me and became pregnant for a second time whilst still been unemployed. When my grandson was 20 months old and my granddaughter was only 4 months old the mother left my son and moved to George with my grandchildren. By that time I was living in Oudtshoorn for 2 months already and was overjoyed as my grandchildren would be close to me however out of spite I was denied all contact with the children by the mother and that was even after a lot of tears and begging. The relationship between me and the mother only improved around November 2014 and I was allowed to have the children over for the Christmas of 2014.

On mother’s day in 2015 I was contacted and told to fetch my grandchildren as they were no longer welcome at her parents and/or grandparents’ house. I made the necessary provision and arrangements then fetched the children at the beginning of June 2015, my grandson had just turned 3 whereas my granddaughter was 1 year old. Sadly they were both underfed, both still on the nappies and also both still drinking from the bottle. Although the boy was already three, he was still wearing nappies & drinking from a bottle but worse is that he was unable to speak at all. They suffered from separation anxiety and would sit in front of my shower waiting for me to finish, terrified that I would leave them alone. It took me hours every night to get them to sleep as they were terrified that I would not be there when they woke up. When we were in the car they would become hysterical the moment that I got out of my car thinking that I would be leaving them in the car alone, it seems as if that they have been left on their own many times. I gave them all the love, security and stability they needed. I taught them what proper food was, something that they were not used to. Slowly but surely they healed.

It was only the father who contributed R 1 800 per month whereas the rest came from my own pocket but all we ever got from the mother were empty promises. The maintenance paid for the school fees. I paid for everything else out of my own pocket.

In October 2016 I requested the assistance of the social services in Oudtshoorn to have the children placed in my custody and although the mother initially agreed to meet the social worker she continuously postponed the meeting until she informed me that she wanted the children back. I was informed by social services that I have no other option but to return the children to the mother which I did in December 2016. I was allowed access to the children thereafter but I believe that it was only allowed because I continued with financial support as I knew that if I had not continued the financial support the children would again be neglected. . In April 2017 they came to visit me in Port Elizabeth as I had relocated but I was devastated to notice how the children’s physical and mental condition had deteriorated but what made matters worse is the children made us privy to their current living conditions situated at the boyfriends mothers house. They stayed with their mother and her boyfriend in a one bedroom Wendy House in the back of his mother’s residential property and they went on to inform us how in the middle of the night when either child needed to relieve themselves they were forced to go out into the cold alone together and walk to the house in the dark so that they could use the loo. The mother would just sleep but each time that one child had to go the other one was awoken to accompany the other. Then the little girl of then 3 years old would describe to us in detail how she saw the boyfriend’s private parts and also the immoral goings-on between the 2 adults. We were shocked beyond belief.

In May 2017 I received a call from the boyfriend`s mother who informed me of the terrible circumstances that my grandchildren are living in. She informed me that the 2 adults would punish the little girl by putting her into the garbage drum with the lid on and the fact that they were really being badly abused. She suggested that I contact the mother and arrange to come and collect the children as she could no longer handle the abuse herself. (I will not enter into all the other detail at present)

I then contacted the mother and she totally agreed that the children came to live with me. When it was time to start looking for a primary school for my grandson it was agreed on that the children would finish their primary school years with me as it would give the mother more than enough time to find her feet and get her life back on track.

After their visit to their mother in July 2018 the children were brought back to me in a terrible emotional state and I had to fight to get the mother to pay her medical aid in order to get the children to a qualified the******. The children never finished their therapy as the mother cancelled the medical aid as she had a fall out with the the****** and she was very unhappy with the diagnosis given to her by the the******. She informed the the****** that she was a waste of money and that there was absolutely nothing wrong with her children. I approached the mother in November asking her to provide us with more of a monthly allowance as she was actually only contributing R 718 per month towards their upkeep in the form of the medical aid payment in most months and strangely enough she agreed to a monthly allowance of R 2700 or so we thought because when we addressed this with her in December and January she passed the buck over to the boyfriend who then interacted directly with my partner as we felt that it would be easier for the 2 men to handle the finances however we unfortunately never again saw a cent as they had excuse after excuse of why they did not pay however this was all part of their new cunning plan to abduct the children and we were none the wiser to what was about to transpire.

On Thursday, 28/02/2019, the mother and her boyfriend secretly arrived in PE to abduct the children but made the error of going straight to the school, walked into the primary school`s office demanding that her children be given to her immediately. The Headmaster however refused to do this as he was aware of the arrangement and that I was the Primary Caregiver for the children, so he sent her to the local police station where warrant office ***XX assisted them.

W/O ***X explained to her that the children cannot be simply taken away from the care giver as they have been living with me for such a long time and that a proper investigation needs to be done first in order to determine what is in the child’s best interests. She was aware that we were going through to George the following weekend and the children were going to be dropped off with her in any case so after the attempted abduction we now needed to ensure the safe return of these 2 children and so the mother then signed an affidavit as her agreement to me that she will return the children back into my care if we dropped them off that weekend and until such time that the court has decided otherwise because now both parties had threatened to go to the Welfare and to court to let the court decide where it is in the best interests for the children to stay.

Everything went off as planned and the arrangement was that we collect the children again during the late Monday afternoon. On our arrival at the mother`s place we were met at a locked gate by the boyfriend and his mother who informed us that there was a court order placing the children in her immediate care and that LINDA HEYNES, the assistant welfare officer of Badisa gave her the instruction NOT to release the children back into my care again. We then phoned the police who came out and found that there was no court order and we could of course not get hold of anybody at Badisa. I have a recording of the statement the mother gave to the officer that assisted us where she specifically mentions that Linda Heynes phoned her and instructed her NOT to release the children. It was then agreed on that we would meet Alta Botma the following morning at 9 to resolve this issue. Warrant Officer ***X phoned Alta from his side but apparently got nowhere as she was also under the impression that the correct thing had been done procedural. It was then agreed that the grandson would spend the night with us and the granddaughter stay the night with the mother and that we all meet the next morning to get this resolved.

Tuesday morning on our way to Badisa`s offices for the arranged 09h00 meeting, the mother sent us a whatsapp informing us that we were now to meet at the Children`s Court. We were unaware that this was another decoy plan of hers as she met us at the court with her lawyer and no official meeting with the child court was ever arranged because this was just another way for her to get us away from the Badisa office where we would have given the real version of events and not the pack of lies as she had done. Her lawyer instructed me that I have absolutely no rights over the children irrespective whether I was the official caregiver or not. He claimed that the law states that the mother is the biological parent in this instance and could do with her children as she pleases. Then he went on further to inform me that as I had no lawyer or evidence present with me for this meeting (that they had tricked us into attending) I could not prove anything that I say and are forced legally to leave the children with the biological mother.

Even the lawyer was not aware of the process relating to this issue which I believe is as follows:

1) There should be a thorough investigation of both the children`s current circumstances as well as the circumstances to be-which was NEVER done 2) All the parties involved should be interviewed-which NEVER happened 3) The schools should be contacted for reports-which was NEVER done 4) A qualified psychologist should interview the children alone-which was NEVER done 5) Children`s advocates would be involved-Never happened 6) The social workers of both parties should be involved-Never happened.

The decision to place the children back in their mother`s care was made by an assistant social worker based on the mother`s version of reality. I was never even given the opportunity to meet with this decision maker. The children was interviewed in front of their mother and they would of course have chosen to stay with her as she has bought them clothes and toys and even each a little bed, things she had never done before. She could not even contribute R700/month towards her children’s upkeep.

As if the above is not enough I now had to learn that I am not allowed to see the children until such time that they have had therapy. Who was the one who took them for therapy before tearing them illegally away from their Primary Caregiver? Who ever thought of the best interest of the children? Definitely not the so-called qualified welfare assistant or the so-called educated lawyer.

They have in their short little lives been in my care for a longer period than the biological mother yet I am the one classified as the criminal. I even phoned the offices at George and was promised that the social worker would phone me back but am I surprised that this was never done, no I am not, I actually expected it because they know all too well that they have transgressed and now cant repair their mistake, the mistake of ripping the lives from 2 young innocent little souls, the people that they are there to protect not to destroy. These people are in positions where they have absolutely no idea of what the law states for their specific duties yet they are allowed to sit with their feet up daily doing nothing and getting nice adequate monthly salaries.

You might ask exactly what do I want done in this regard, well firstly I would love to have suggested that my grandchildren be returned to me however in their best interests I honestly do not believe that this is now possible until a proper investigation has been finalized even though my grandson is crying himself to sleep every night and that is what the mother shared with me over this past weekend BUT I need the necessary action to be taken against Linda Heynes, she can be fired for what I care but if action is not taken I will take this diabolical decision of Badisa’s to the newspapers in order to get the required reaction because you cannot allow this woman to work in this environment when she does not have a clue of what she is doing both in her own work and then to the lives of the poor children that she is supposedly there to protect and the caregivers who do what they do for the best interests of the children.

Taken the above into consideration I cannot see any of the promises or procedures in your so-called mission and I would like to challenge you on proving me wrong but rest assured that this issue will be reported to the highest level of government as well.