Spescom donates R100k to Childline

Spescom recently donated R100 000 to Childline to provide funds to assist Childline's development of services to children in South Africa, an issue close to Spescom's heart.

Says Chris Lamprecht, Group Executive: Human Resources at Spescom Limited: "Spescom's Corporate Social Investment strategy is geared towards the provision of essential services, and what could be more essential than providing a lifeline to children in distress?"

Childline South Africa is a non-profit organisation that works to protect children from all forms of violence. Childline has a national office, which fulfils a co-ordinating, administrative and development function while every province in South Africa has regional office. When a child calls the toll-free crisis line, their call is immediately directed to a counsellor in their respective province.

Joan van Niekerk, Manager Training and Advocacy at Childline, says: "One of the major challenges that we face lies in trying to provide a standard service to all children around the country. Due to the lack of access to government funding, some provinces are better resourced than others. Children being abused in Gauteng or the Western Cape, for example, will get better service than children residing in Limpopo or Mpumalanga. The biggest challenge for Childline right now is trying to provide the same level of service to children across all our nine provincial offices."

Childline not only provides a service to children and teenagers. A support service is offered to both parents and educators. Services offered by Childline include everything from educational programmes in schools to information on children's rights, child abuse, HIV/Aids and responsible relationships and sexual behaviour.

The most crucial service offered to children in distress is the 24-hour

Childline toll-free number, where the initial contact is made with a child who needs help. Trained counsellors are always on hand to deal with a wide variety of issues and problems.

Some of the problems children face today are abuse (physical, emotional, sexual), abandonment and neglect, bullying and harassment or loneliness and divorce, and it is common for children to call the toll-free line a number of times just to see if someone out there can actually help them. These are referred to as "test calls" and a counsellor dealing with a test call will speak to the child despite the fact that there may be no response.

Counsellors will endeavour to gain the child's trust while offering reassurance and encouragement to talk about their problems.

The common situations that teenagers have to face include relationship problems with peers, parents or teachers as well as sexual problems, pregnancy and attempted suicide. Childline has now offered a crisis counselling service on the popular social networking site - Mxit, although it is still in the testing phase, it has so far been extremely successful in providing teenagers with access to a counsellor within a medium they feel most comfortable. One of the most common and alarming problems reported by teenagers is "cutting", which seems to be a growing phenomenon.

The call volumes that Childline experiences are between approximately 60 000 and 90 000 a month and up to a million calls a year. During December, call volumes double, largely due to the fact that the 16 days of activism falls within this period. Says Van Niekerk: "Spescom's donation of R100 000 to Childline went to the heart of the organisation - our crisis hotline - and was used to maintain and support this hotline during the month of December, and the government's 16 days of activism campaign. This enabled the provision of a high standard of service equal to all provinces and children across South Africa, Lamprecht adds: "We are delighted to make this donation to Childline, knowing it has enabled many more children in desperate situations to speak to a counsellor and access the help and reassurance that they need."

"So many people say that 'children are the future' without really knowing what this means. At Spescom, we have taken this sentiment to heart and we are so proud to have been able to partner with Childline knowing that our donation contributed to providing a better service to children in need."