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Cape residents vexed by slow service, `off-line` system at Home Affairs office

Source: Cape Argus, 21/08/2020

Zaida Khan, 21, who stood at the front of the queue, said she had arrived at 6am yesterday and that was the third time she had visited the office after she was told to go back to a hospital to fetch a form indicating birth details of her child.
â€œIt is raining and we are standing outside the gates with our children. I came here to apply for my child`s birth certificate,â€ Khan said.
More than 100 people, including the elderly, pupils and women carrying newborns, complained that they had been waiting since 5am to be helped.
Asanda Duda, from Samora Machel in Nyanga, said they were tired of leaving their homes before dawn to wait outside the Home Affairs office, only to be turned away in the afternoon without having been served and forced to return day after day.
Duda said the employees at the office should extend their working hours to compensate for the backlog. â€œHome Affairs should make plans on how to deal with huge numbers that are visiting their branches because we can`t carry on like this. At some point, we will get sick,â€ Duda said.
An outraged resident, Mary Hughes, 64, from Delft, said she was desperately trying to get Identity documents and had hoped that after spending hours in the queue, â€œI would get some helpâ€.
Hughes said although she was first in line, people who were not served the previous day had been given numbered tickets by the office and were served before her.
Home Affairs spokesperson Siya Qoza said there were numerous reasons why the network was off-line. Those could be technical or because of cable theft or damage.
â€œThe department has a team which identifies the causes of the downtime and fixes it. In the Western Cape, the provincial office, in partnership with community radio, proactively issues daily updates about which offices are experiencing challenges,â€ Qoza said.
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