AHMR African Human Mobilty Review - Volume 6 No 2, MAY-AUG 2020 rants more attention in future studies. CHILDHOOD STATELESSNESS Statelessness is a major concern for countries “with mandates to reinforce national borders, promote national security and prevent ‘aliens’ from making claims on citizen services including social protection, education and healthcare” (Ball et al. 2014: 2). A high risk of childhood statelessness has been observed in relation to (i) children of cross-border migrants without official documents; (ii) children who are in a country without legal status; (iii) unaccompanied and separated children; (iv) children born in another country that is not their parent’s country of origin; (v) children left in the care of relatives when parents migrate or in residential care facilities; and (iv) children fending for themselves when parents leave their country of origin to become (economic) migrants. Lack of birth registration by irregular migrants can also contribute to their children’s state of statelessness. In light of this, the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) acknowledged the right to nationality as a fundamental right and that all children must be registered at birth irrespective of their parent’s immigration status, nationality, statelessness, disability or gender status. Despite this, the obstacles to birth registration by irregular immigrants include the lack of knowledge and understanding of the relevant legislation and policies by and attitudes of officials; ignorance of migrants regarding knowledge on the necessary requirements and processes; lack of vital resources, such as time, money (transport, time off work etc.); lack of consideration for future benefits vs current or immediate costs; fear of consequences emanating from irregular immigration status, such as arrest, deportation, family separation; and physical location and restrictions of movement (Ball et al., 2014; Van Waas, 2007). A further study by Bhabha (2011) report that the main challenges associated with birth registration are “timely, affordable, friendly, linguistically appropriate access to birth registration process”. Ball et al. (2014) agree that the challenges transcend the mere awareness of benefits and reasonable access to facilities. If parents are not residing in their country of origin during the birth of the child, it is less likely that the child would be registered, thus increasing the child’s vulnerability (Ball et al., 2017). In their respective research studies, Van Waas (2007) and Ball et al. (2014) found that the perks that come with citizenship might rank lower on the priority list of undocumented transnational migrants. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs indicates that they would first try to meet a child’s basic needs in order to ensure the child’s survival, including psychosocial security and social protection. However, this debate is more complex than it seems, and more insights and research are needed in this area. It is crucial to consider the consequences of statelessness through a human rights lens. This is because statelessness has been linked to discrimination in relation to accessing basic rights and it could render the individual vulnerable to other human rights violations (Foster and Lambert, 2016). Children whose births go un12