Leaders, activists, and Nobel Prize winners unite in a promise of solidarity with refugees

Maintaining self-awareness outside the role of a mother is not selfishness; it is a reminder that a woman's worth is determined not only by how much she gives, sacrifices, or carries.

Self-realization outside of motherhood

Motherhood represents one of the most significant and transformative experiences in a woman's life. It brings unique love, forms a deep bond, stimulates growth, and teaches responsibility in ways unavailable to many other roles. Although motherhood transforms a woman's life, it should not demand her complete dissolution into this role.

For generations, women have been encouraged to define themselves through caring for others. Often mothers ask about children before asking about themselves, and conversations focus on school schedules, family rituals, household chores, and the needs of those around them. Slowly and often unnoticed, the belief forms: your identity exists to serve others.

However, women are whole individuals long before having children. Motherhood merely complements who she is, but it should not replace her essence. Before children, women had dreams, hobbies, friendships, ambitions, interests, values, and parts of their personality that mattered. These aspects do not lose their importance after children arrive; they still deserve a place for development.

Benefits for Children and Balance

Maintaining one's own identity outside of motherhood is not a selfish act. It is the realization that a woman's dignity is not measured solely by her contribution, sacrifices, or what she bears. When women continue to invest in themselves through career, creativity, education, friendship, travel, business, search for meaning, public activity, spirituality, rest, or simple joys, they create a more fulfilling and healthy life. Children benefit from watching their mothers respect themselves.

Children, seeing their mothers value themselves, learn an important lesson: love does not require self-abandonment. They understand that adulthood is not disappearing into duties, but creating a life that supports both caring for others and caring for oneself.

Emotional Responsibility in the Family

Part of maintaining this balance involves understanding the emotional responsibility in the parent-child relationship. Children are not responsible for their mothers' happiness. This statement does not diminish the joy that children bring; they add invaluable meaning to life, but they should never feel responsible for the parent's satisfaction, identity, or emotional well-being. This burden is too heavy for a child.

Similarly, mothers are not obligated to constantly make their children happy. Their role is to provide love, safety, guidance, emotional support, boundaries, and a secure space for growth. However, children must also develop the ability to experience disappointment, regulate emotions, build self-confidence, and find themselves independently of their parents.

When these emotional boundaries blur, children may begin to take on responsibilities that are not theirs. The author emphasizes that she consciously tries to regulate her emotional state to protect her children's childhood, as she does not want them to feel the weight of responsibility for an adult.

This does not mean pretense or hiding emotions. The author wants children to see that adults experience sadness, frustration, disappointment, and stress, but also that adults are responsible for their own feelings. If she is struggling, she does not ask children to save her or expect them to fix her feelings or take on problems beyond their age. Instead, she processes complex emotions with the support of adults, healthy coping mechanisms, reflection, and compassion.

With children, the author focuses on creating emotional safety, teaching them that emotions are welcome, but no one is responsible for another person's feelings. She often reminds them: 'Your job is not to take care of me. Your job is to grow. To play. To discover who you are.' And her job is to walk alongside them, continuing to remember herself.

Because the greatest gift a mother can give her children is to show them that she has her own world, and to give them permission to build their own world.

The Department of Social Development has not utilized its R4.8 billion social benefit budget for 2025/26. This fact raises serious questions, especially considering that pensioners in rural KwaZulu-Natal have to travel long distances to reach inaccessible taxis and wait for hours in offices that may deny them service.

Distribution of unused funds

The unspent R4.8 billion includes R793 million solely for old age pensions, R533 million for child support, and R318 million for disability grants. These funds, intended to support the poorest residents of South Africa, amount to approximately R1200 extra per person annually, but they have not reached the recipients.

Systemic issues and reporting

Arguments such as 'stricter vetting and reduction of beneficiaries' are not justifications, as they indicate that the system has become better at retaining money from the poor than delivering it to them. This problem is not new: in 2020/21, the ministry disclosed R1.32 billion in irregular expenditures. Only the Gauteng provincial branch accumulated over R1.3 billion by the start of 2025, including R142 million for 'dignity packages' purchased in one year but paid for only in the next.

Accountability of leadership

The Chief Auditor has repeatedly found that no one is held accountable for such incidents, and this cycle repeats annually. Batabile Dlamini led the grant crisis in 2017, which endangered the lives of 10 million beneficiaries. The Constitutional Court personally deemed her 'reckless and grossly negligent' and ordered her to pay 20% of legal costs out of her own pocket in 2018—the first time a public official was forced to do so. It took her three years to make this payment. In 2022, she was convicted of perjury during an investigation into her own activities.

In 2026, Sisisi Tolashe was dismissed by Ramaphosa after months of scandals—it was a dismissal, not a prosecution. The acting minister held the post for six weeks before Dina Pule was appointed at the end of June, returning to the cabinet more than ten years after being removed as Minister of Communications due to a hidden conflict of interest, while a conference worth R120 million under her leadership grew to R600 million.

Qualifications and ministerial scandals

Examining the qualifications of these individuals reveals that Dlamini, despite being trained as a social worker, arrived in office already convicted of fraud in the 2006 Travelgate case. Susan Shabangu, a former union activist, served for only about 15 months without any qualifications in social welfare or administration. Lindive Zulu brought a journalism degree and decades of ANC diplomacy, rather than expertise in social policy. Tolashe had no higher qualifications in official documents—her achievements were based on activism and rank in the ANC Women's League, not management.

Tolashe was also accused before Parliament of redirecting state 'food assistance' hired by the department with a salary of about R15,814 per month to work as an unpaid nanny in her private home, with about half of that salary paid monthly to her own daughter. The worker's lawyer told Parliament that she was 'treated like a slave.' Tolashe denied knowledge of these payments under oath; her dismissal occurred later due to an unrelated vehicle donation, not because of this.

Unfulfilled promises and contrast

Zulu spent five years promising a permanent basic income grant that would replace the 'temporary' SRD grant of R370; seven years after the introduction of this grant, it remains as temporary as it was on its inception day. Four ministers, 16 years—crisis, condemnation, frozen promise, scandal. Not a single managerial decision has survived the term of its minister, and none of them were initially suitable for the position.

The situation resembles a village headman who changes every few years, while the results for the villagers remain unchanged. Such leadership, unable to find R4.8 billion for its elders and unable to appoint a qualified minister to manage its department, still travels under police and private security escort. They are protected from the very villagers, using the villagers' money, for protection they never consented to.

Security spending versus citizen needs

While benefit recipients queue from dawn for a grant of a few thousand rand per month, the country spends nearly R2.5 billion annually on VIP security for the president and cabinet. Furthermore, VIP security units reported overtime of R360 million since 2022 and R42 million for fuel over six years for blue light convoys that regularly obstruct regular drivers on the roads. Additionally, each minister receives an annual salary of R2.79 million, in addition to free official accommodation, a service vehicle, a state-provided housekeeper, and business flights.

Proposals for governance improvement

There are four proposals to improve the situation. Firstly, unused funds must be allocated: legally, unused grant budgets should automatically roll over to the following year's payments, not be returned to the Treasury as 'savings.' Secondly, real consequences are required. The recommendations of the Auditor-General are meaningless if no official is ever fired or prosecuted for irregular expenditures. The Parliamentary Portfolio Committee must demand this annually, not just when a crisis forces action.

Thirdly, ministers should be vetted for suitability for the role, not their party resume. The social development portfolio, controlling R271 billion annually, deserves a minister with experience in public administration, social policy, or financial development, not just a title within the party structure. Fourthly, the minister's effectiveness—and the size of their security detail—must be tied to measurable service delivery outcomes, not press conference promises. A minister who cannot reduce a queue in six months has no right to drive past it at speed.

This ministry exists to serve the poorest and most forgotten people in the province and the country. However, for over a decade, it has become a place where political careers come to recover, where unqualified appointments go unpunished, and where the people who need government presence the most are the last ones it visits. This situation must change—starting with someone in Pretoria deciding that the dignity of the poor is more important than the dignity of a motorcade, and that accountability finally rests with them.

A new resource center named Ona Uyi has started its operations in the city of Termez. This center is designed for women facing difficult life circumstances along with their children, providing them with comprehensive support.

Types of Assistance Provided

Women who apply to the new center can count on safe temporary housing, food provision, as well as consultations from specialists in psychology, law, and social assistance. In addition, center staff assist participants in restoring necessary documents, obtaining education, and finding employment.

Goals and Scale of the Project

The main mission of the project is to support mothers who face difficulties preventing them from independently ensuring decent conditions for themselves and their children. The primary goal of the center is to help these families get through a crisis and keep the child in their native family.

The Ona Uyi network has been operating in Uzbekistan since 2024. Currently, centers are active in several cities, including Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara, Andijan, Kuvasay, Chirchik, Nukus, and Termez.

Results of Center Operations

According to project data, over 200 women have received assistance during the period of the centers' operation, and 265 children were able to remain with their families. Among the achievements noted are that 43 program participants found employment, 53 children were enrolled in kindergartens, and 20 children were born as part of the project.

Funding and Opening

The opening of the center in Termez was made possible by the financial support of entrepreneurs Aidyn Rakhimbayev and Bosithon Khaydarkhanov. The opening ceremony was attended by representatives of state structures, public organizations, and project partners.