Pretoria - South Africa will soon issue only unabridged birth certificates, Home Affairs Minister Naledi Pandor said in Pretoria on Thursday.
The documents, which were sometimes referred to as “full birth certificates”, would be issued to the parents of new-born babies from March, she said.
“We are pleased to announce to the people of South Africa that from March 4, the department will end the practice of issuing the abridged birth certificates and will only issue unabridged certificates,” she said.
“The unabridged certificate contains the details of the child, the mother, the father, and their identity numbers.”
Pandor said the unabridged certificates would be issued at no cost.
The abridged certificates, which were sometimes called the short form, were prone to illegal reproduction.
They contained details of the child and the mother, but not the father, and took six to eight weeks to produce.
“We will be ensuring that we improve our turnaround time and that we (provide) speedy, efficient, and accurate service delivery, something we strive for as a department,” said Pandor.
Security features on the unabridged certificates had also been improved.
“This will help us to have a more secure national population register because of the security improvements.
“We are therefore confident that we will not have persons registering children who were not born in South Africa,” she said.
Abridged certificates would still be legally recognised as registrations of children. - Sapa