{"id":2751,"date":"2021-08-29T09:28:00","date_gmt":"2021-08-29T09:28:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/the-child-headed-families-in-lesotho"},"modified":"2021-08-29T09:28:00","modified_gmt":"2021-08-29T09:28:00","slug":"the-child-headed-families-in-lesotho","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/the-child-headed-families-in-lesotho","title":{"rendered":"The child-headed families in Lesotho"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press<\/a> – Lesotho<\/a>. <\/strong><\/span>LIOPELO* is just 13-years old but is already a \u201cmother\u201d to her three siblings. Every morning, Liopelo prepares a meal for all of them, prepares them for school before making a beeline for school.<\/p>\n

The youngest is three years and goes to a nearby cr\u00e8che. When her parents died last year at different intervals, Liopelo was only a child. \u201cWhen my father first passed away, I saw how my mother struggled thereafter.<\/p>\n

Her struggle in raising us as a single parent was short-lived when she also passed on months later. I was broken,\u201d she said. She had no choice but to quickly grow-up and play mother to her siblings with whom she shares a single, dilapidated room.<\/p>\n

Members of her extended family are not willing to live and take care of the orphans, leaving Liopelo to head the household. The closure of schools has made the situation worse. The closure of schools means many children who relied on school feeding programmes are going hungry. These include Liopelo and her siblings.<\/p>\n

When Liopelo runs out of ideas on what to feed the family, she goes around the neighbourhood asking for small quantities of basic food items such as maize-meal, salt and leaves of moroho.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes they (neighbours) are able to help, and sometimes they are not,\u201d said Liopelo says.<\/p>\n

This week, joy filled Liopelo\u2019s face when her family received food parcels from World Vision together with more than 800 other beneficiaries in \u2018Mate.<\/p>\n

According to \u2019Mathapelo Letho, the councillor for Menkhoaneng 37 of the beneficiaries are child-headed families. \u201cMost of these children are 16 and 17 years old while others are younger than that,\u201d Letho told thepost.<\/p>\n

She described the poverty in the area as \u201cdevastating\u201d. Although the majority of the poverty-stricken households receive assistance from the ministry of social development, the help is often inadequate to meet their basic needs.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe money comes quarterly and food has become expensive,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

She said some families were struggling because family members who used to work in South Africa are out of jobs due to the coronavirus linked lockdown.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are trying times for everyone. Businesses are failing and families are struggling, we all need to treat each other with care and courtesy,\u201d Letho said.<\/p>\n

\u2019Mate chief, Selebalo, said the pandemic \u201chas made everyone vulnerable and everyone hungry\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have been accused of choosing beneficiaries unfairly when we submit names to donors,\u201d Chief Selebalo said.<\/p>\n

Chief Selebalo said child headed families are a priority. \u201cThey are on our priority list because they are the most vulnerable,\u201d he said. Beneficiaries of the World Vision programme received maize meal, bread flour, cooking oil and tinned fish. According to UNICEF, more than 80 000 families are caring for orphans and other vulnerable children in Lesotho.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Lesotho. LIOPELO* is just 13-years old but is already a \u201cmother\u201d to her three siblings. Every morning, Liopelo prepares a meal for all of them, prepares them for school before making a beeline for school. The youngest is three years and goes to a nearby cr\u00e8che. When her parents died last year at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":2750,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,8,9,16],"tags":[233,246,317,245],"class_list":["post-2751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-homepage-english","category-miscellaneous","category-twitter","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-lesotho","tag-child","tag-lesotho"],"yoast_head":"\nThe child-headed families in Lesotho - Lesotho<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/the-child-headed-families-in-lesotho\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The child-headed families in Lesotho\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Africa-Press – Lesotho. LIOPELO* is just 13-years old but is already a \u201cmother\u201d to her three siblings. Every morning, Liopelo prepares a meal for all of them, prepares them for school before making a beeline for school. The youngest is three years and goes to a nearby cr\u00e8che. 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