Scalabrini Centre 47 Commercial Street Cape Town, 8001 Tel: +27 (0) 21 465 6433 Fax: +27 (0) 21 465 6317 www.scalabrini.org.za TO: Adv Tsietsi Sebelemetja and Adv Moses Malakate Department of Home Affairs 230 Johannes Ramokhoase Street Pretoria BY EMAIL: Tsietsi.Sebelemetja@dha.gov.za; Moses.Malakate@dha.gov.za RE: SUBMISSIONS ON THE DRAFT REGULATIONS ON THE REGISTRATION OF BIRTHS AND DEATHS, 2018 Introduction The Scalabrini Centre of Cape Town (‘SCCT’) is a registered NGO offering specialised services to migrants, refugees and South Africans. The SCCT’s services focus on key areas including para-legal advice, advocacy and research, development and integration, and well-being and welfare. The Advocacy Programme functions as a walk-in paralegal office, and as such, the SCCT receives individuals who present problems around access to basic rights, including issues of birth registration. We regularly provide assistance to foreign parents in registering birth of their children as well as advice to caregivers, social workers or any interested party, on the legal framework and documentation considerations. In our experience, foreign parents who have expired documents, or do not hold legal stay in South Africa, face numerous obstacles in registering births to the extent that many are unable to do so. This not only denies the child their constitutional right to birth registration but also creates a series of effects that perpetuate an undocumented state, which is not in the interests of the South African state or region. We therefore welcome the opportunity to provide input to the Draft Regulations on the Registration of Birth and Deaths 2018 (‘Draft Regulations’). Our submission first focuses on the challenges faced by foreign nationals in registering birth of their children and then provides recommendations to improve the framework. 1