When you look into the beaming face of any of the happy children at Tsoga O Itirele, a school for the mentally disabled, it’s difficult to understand why anyone would be afraid of them.
Some of the children here were found wandering the street, dirty and half naked, because their parents didn’t know how to look after them or just didn’t care. Their attitude towards their own children is echoed throughout society, where ignorance leaves the mentally disabled vulnerable to discrimination and neglect.
Enter a feisty crew of big-hearted Limpopo women, hell-bent on challenging their small rural community’s ignorance.
At the helm is Anna Noko, whose efforts to feed and love the mentally disabled children in the Lebowakgomo community near Polokwane sparked the compassion of other women.
‘I was heartbroken when I saw how kids would taunt their mentally disabled peers,” she says.
She can tell countless tales of children who were locked up, neglected, physically and emotionally abused or used for their disability grant.
‘As a mother of seven children I couldn’t bear to witness the neglect,” she says. ‘As a mother I felt I had no choice but to care for these children and try to solve their problems.”
She started by bringing mentally disabled street children to her home for a hearty plate of food and a good scrub. It was a small help, but her generous spirit soon inspired other women in the community. Before long, 19 women had banded with Noko to form a social club to offer care where they could.
‘In June 1995, we went from house to house to plead with the parents to let us look after their mentally disabled children while they were at work,” Noko says.
Surprisingly, most of the parents refused.
‘They were ashamed and didn’t want other people in the community to find out that they had a child that was handicapped,” she says.
It was a frustrating start, but they eventually convinced three sets of parents to allow their children to be looked after during the day. A year later the small one-roomed house was bursting with the song and laughter of 20 children.
Mental disabilities usually start from birth or early childhood and are often linked to factors associated with poverty, like malnutrition and a lack of specialised medical care in the face of illness and injury.
Although children with mental disabilities tend to learn slowly and have a limited ability to learn, any of the teachers or volunteers at Tsoga O Itirele (a setSwana phrase meaning ‘wake up and do it yourself”) will vouch that their capacity for growth is as broad as anyone else’s.
With time and donations the care centre began to flourish and has now blossomed into a small boarding school. Three teachers and a principal are employed, as well as seven of the original volunteers, to educate the 110 pupils currently registered.
Principal Anna Moloto says the birth of the school saw her realise a childhood dream.
‘When I was a child I dreamt that when I grew up I would teach mentally disabled children,” she says. ‘I used to pray for God to give me the strength and wisdom to teach the community that to be mentally disabled does not mean you are an animal.”
Moloto has first-hand experience of what it feels like to be on the receiving end of a community’s ignorance and cruelty.
‘When I was young, people laughed at us because my brother was mentally disabled,” Moloto says. ‘I used to cry because I had such a strong bond with my brother – I loved him more than anybody else.”
Then in 1987 her childhood resolve was rekindled, however, when her son’s teachers began to say he was handicapped. ‘I told the teachers that my child was a slow learner and needed special attention,” she says. But the teachers ignored her and tried to promote her son to Grade 4, even though he couldn’t write.
‘I told them to keep him back until he learnt to write,” she says.
The teachers’ indifference spurred her on to quit her job and register for a bachelor of arts in special needs teaching through Unisa.
‘I wanted to show the teachers what my son could achieve if he was given special attention,” Moloto says.
Her son is now a full-time cost and accounting management student at Pretoria Technikon and Moloto has transferred her nurturing energies to the school.
It’s a tough job and the teachers and volunteers are overworked because, ‘looking after one mentally disabled child is like looking after five normal children”.
They also have a difficult time recruiting staff because prospective teachers usually bail out after a week’s trial.
But their most difficult battle lies with uncaring parents.
‘We often have to rely on the police to track down the parents of pupils when they fail to collect their children in the holidays,” Moloto says.
Through the many ups and downs that Tsoga O Itirele has endured Noko and her crew are striving to prove that with love, determination and baby steps even a monster as daunting as fear can be overcome.