Cape Town -
A Khayelitsha mother who allegedly abandoned her three-year-old child - who police found in Vrygrond and handed to a local NGO for temporary safekeeping - was due to know on Monday whether her child will be taken away from her.
This is according to Lucinda Evans, founder and director of Lavender Hill’s Philisa Abafazi Bethu NGO and safehouse, which provides temporary shelter to women and child victims of domestic violence, and sexual and other abuse.
”The child was abandoned in Vrygrond,” said Evans.
“The police contacted us to temporarily take charge of the child. It arrived at our safehouse at 1.30am on December 26.
“We had the child for 13 hours. It had to be placed in a place of safety.”
The child’s fate, in terms of whether it will be returned to the mother or removed from her, will be decided by a Simon’s Town Magistrate’s Court presiding officer, she said.
The 25-year-old mother, whose identity cannot be revealed, had been informed to appear with a Department of Social Development social worker in front of the presiding officer, according to Evans.
Muizenberg police media communications officer Captain Stephen Knapp confirmed that the Muizenberg police picked up the abandoned child and handed it over to Evans and the Philisa Abafazi Bethu NGO.
Cape Times