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 Challenges and Issues Faced by Special Interest Groups Un-documented children are at risk of being prosecuted as adults thereby incurring stiffer sentences than would be the case if they were documented98. Section 135 of the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act provides that un-documented children in conflict with the law, cannot be released on bail. They are required to go for age estimations which sometimes take time and might not be accurate. Government hospitals lack functional equipment to undertake age estimation and private health facilities which carry out age estimation do not accept Government’s Assisted Medical Treatment Order (AMTO) voucher which allows one to access free medical services in Government /mission health facilities. There is no funding from Government to cater for age estimation in private health institutions since this is supposed to be done in Government/mission health facilities99. Children with disabilities (CWDs) are often hidden by their parents, other family members and community members as a result of negative and discriminatory attitudes towards PWDs thereby remaining unregistered. 4.2 Orphans Out of thirty-eight point five per cent (38.5%) of people who cited socio-cultural factors as barriers to access documentation, twenty point five per cent (20.5%) of these were orphans. Orphans often failed to acquire national documents due to lack of prerequisite documents such as death certificates for deceased parents; unavailability of witnesses; unknown whereabouts of relatives or lack of cooperation from relatives. The DSW assisted un-documented orphans in children’s homes (whose relatives could not be traced)100 to be issued with short birth certificates but these were not accepted in schools leading to failure to participate in sporting activities. They were also not accepted for issuance of passports. Orphans failed to receive assistance to get registered by the DSW due to lack of knowledge of the different available options for registration. Generational challenges of lack of documentation were prevalent among orphans. Un-documented orphans failed to receive social welfare benefits such as food aid and subsidised tuition through the Basic Education Assistance Module (BEAM). 4.3 Women Some women without documentation were divorced because of failure to meet requirements for registering their children’s birth101. Some un-documented women often experienced cases of gender-based violence from their husbands, who were frustrated by failure to register children, or from the children themselves when they are grown up. Un-documented women face stigmatization and were referred to as “zvidhuura” (meaning fake people) in some communities.102 Highlights from Legal Resources Foundation, TRACE ATD and Justice for Children Trust submissions. This was highlighted by the Bulawayo Provincial Social Welfare Officer. 100 Representatives from the DSW highlighted that their mandate included registering abandoned orphans whilst the responsibility to register orphans with known relatives lies with the relatives. 101 Women across all age groups in all the provinces bear the burden of challenges associated with lack of identity documents. Out of a total of 7544 submissions received, 64.6% were submissions from women. 102 . This was revealed in testimony from Mutasa in Manicaland Province. 98 99 34 34