N AT I O N A L I N Q U I R Y R E P O R T ZIMBABWE HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION For Human Dignity Demand for completion of lobola payment 0.6% Lack of co-operation to register child by parents 6.6% Whereabouts of parents unknown 9.3% Difficulties in presenting witnesses 10.3% Difficulties in registering orphans 20.5% Figure 12 Socio and cultural norms affecting documentation 3.3.1 Demand for Lobola Payment Evidence established that when one parent is deceased, particularly the mother, male witnesses reported that they faced difficulties in obtaining birth certificates for their children because the maternal relatives refused to cooperate. There were testimonies of children with deceased mothers who had failed to have their births registered because their maternal relatives insisted on lobola issues being settled first before they availed themselves as witnesses or offered any other form of assistance during the registration process. 3.3.2 Un-documented Mothers “I do not have a birth certificate and Where a mother was un-documented, that is to say not having a an ID. My parents separated when I birth certificate, this resulted in failure to register children, even in was young and their whereabouts are cases where the father of the child was documented. In some unknown. I have children and they are instances, this resulted in some husbands divorcing their wives un-documented because I don’t have and returning them to their families as they were unable to register documents myself”. 56-year-old their children because they were not documented. This was female, Pumula North District, illustrated by a Councillor from Mutasa District who testified that Bulawayo Metropolitan Province marriages within her ward were breaking down irretrievably with husbands referring to their un-documented wives as zvidhuura, meaning they were fake owing to non-possessing of identity documents. 3.3.3 Religious Beliefs Evidence established that some religious beliefs were a barrier in accessing identity documents, particularly for some members of the Apostolic Faith Sect. Members of this congregation do not allow their members to give birth in clinics and hospitals, resulting in non-availability of birth confirmation records for their children. Despite the fact that some DRG’s offices84 had come up with special mechanisms to register children born in such circumstances, some members still refused to comply. 84 For example, in Bulawayo Metropolitan Province, community leaders were asked to come up with birth registers to be later used in support of applications for birth registration. 28 28