Online Reporter
Bongani Ndlovu in Binga
Obtaining a birth certificate is an easy exercise for many people in urban areas, but not so for those in remote and hard-to-reach communities due to connectivity challenges.
Long distances to registry service facilities and dangerous wild animals are among the hurdles many face in rural areas such as Siamusanga in Binga District, Matabeleland North Province.
Things that people in cities take for granted, such as a birth certificate or a national identification document, which allows one to travel using public transport, are a challenge for those in rural areas, where access to such services is limited. For Emma Mwinde, it took her a trip from Gokwe under Chief Chireya in the company of her husband, Jonathan Siamsonga, who works at a fishing village.
She heard over the phone that there was a week-long mobile registration exercise being held in Binga by the Government through the Civil Registry Department, in partnership with Unicef and the Embassy of Sweden, and she decided to take the risk. The exercise started on July 7 and will end on July 11. This is part of Zimbabwe’s integrated efforts to increase birth registration coverage, now at 57 percent, according to the latest Zimbabwe Demographic and Health Survey (ZDHS 2023–24). The initiative highlights how policy reforms by the Second Republic — decentralisation, digital innovation, and community empowerment — are driving tangible improvements in children’s access to legal identity. The village where this initiative is taking place is 160km from Binga Centre and accessible via a difficult road, which takes around seven hours to navigate. It is 7km from the border with Zambia, under Chief Siamusanga. The fishing village, where Mwinde’s husband works, is about 20 km away from Siamusanga Primary School.
On Tuesday morning, with their three-year-old daughter, they began walking to the venue before dawn. About 8 kilometres into their three-hour journey, Mwinde said they encountered a herd of elephants.
“We stopped. I was carrying the baby on my back. It was just frightening, but we know the nature of this place. There are elephants and also lions that roam around here,” he said.
“So, we let them pass and we continued the journey when we were sure that all was clear,” said Mwinde.
Having to side-step elephants and hide behind trees while on the lookout for a pride of lions, just to get birth certificates for your children, is worth the risk, according to Mwinde, as they would otherwise have had to travel to Siabuwa, which is over 60km away from where they live.
