Childline South Africa is a non-profit organisation which works to protect children from violence and further the culture of

children's rights Children's rights are a subset of human rights with particular attention to the rights of special protection and care afforded to minors.

in South Africa. Childline runs a national, 24-hour, toll-free telephone counselling service for children and adults, handling over 1 million calls annually. In addition to the Crisis Line

telephone counseling Telephone counseling refers to any type of psychological service performed over the telephone. Telephone counseling ranges from individual, couple or group psychotherapy with a professional therapist to psychological first aid provided by para-prof ...

service, Childline also offers services such as

online counseling Online counseling is a form of professional mental health counseling that is generally performed through the internet. Computer aided technologies are used by the trained professional counsellors and individuals seeking counselling services to comm ...

, training programmes for

continuous professional development Professional development is learning to earn or maintain professional credentials such as academic degrees to formal coursework, attending conferences, and informal learning opportunities situated in practice. It has been described as intensive ...

, training on court preparation and workshops on child law.

Crisis line telephone counselling

The 24-hour national telephone counselling service is available to children up to 21 years of age, as well as adults with concerns about children. Telephone calls are routed to the Childline office closest to the caller, where trained counsellors are available to provide assistance. Calls to the Crisis Line are free from South African telephone networks Telkom,

Vodacom Vodacom Group Limited is a South-Western African mobile communications company, providing voice, messaging, data and converged services to over 55 million customers. From its roots in South Africa, Vodacom has grown its operations to include n ...

and

CellC Cell C Limited (stylised as Cell ©) is as a private mobile operator based in Sandstone, South Africa. It was founded in November 2001 by Lambert Moloi. As of August 2019, the Company’s current CEO is Douglas Craigie Stevenson Douglas may re ...

, with the exception of MTN. Counsellors are trained to deal with a wide variety of issues.

Online counselling

Childline offered a free, online counselling service through the discontinued Mxit

instant messaging Instant messaging (IM) technology is a type of online chat allowing real-time text transmission over the Internet or another computer network. Messages are typically transmitted between two or more parties, when each user inputs text and trigge ...

application which was available to youth under the age of 21 years, as well as to adults with concerns about children. Initially trialled as a pilot project in 2009, the service quickly saw thousands of young people making use of it to seek help.

Chat rooms The term chat room, or chatroom (and sometimes group chat; abbreviated as GC), is primarily used to describe any form of synchronous conferencing, occasionally even asynchronous conferencing. The term can thus mean any technology, ranging from ...

were staffed by trained counselors based at the Childline national office in

Durban Durban ( ) ( zu, eThekwini, from meaning 'the port' also called zu, eZibubulungwini for the mountain range that terminates in the area), nicknamed ''Durbs'',Ishani ChettyCity nicknames in SA and across the worldArticle on ''news24.com'' from ...

, and were operational Monday to Saturday, from 2 pm to 6 pm. Conversations between children and counsellors were strictly confidential and were conducted on a one-on-one basis, which allowed children to seek assistance on topics they would have ordinarily found difficult to discuss. Children who required face-to-face services may have been referred to their closest regional office for further counselling.

Partnerships

Google

Google is partnered with Childline in promoting online safety for children through its online child safety campaign, launched on 1 June 2012. The partnership is intended to facilitate the co-ordination of work done by government, industry and civil society. The online child safety campaign saw the launch of a South African version of the Google Family Safety Centre, available in English,

isiZulu Zulu (), or isiZulu as an endonym, is a Southern Bantu language of the Nguni branch spoken in Southern Africa. It is the language of the Zulu people, with about 12 million native speakers, who primarily inhabit the province of KwaZulu-Natal of ...

and

Afrikaans Afrikaans (, ) is a West Germanic language that evolved in the Dutch Cape Colony from the Dutch vernacular of Holland proper (i.e., the Hollandic dialect) used by Dutch, French, and German settlers and their enslaved people. Afrikaans gra ...

, and provides parents with information on how to prevent children from being exposed to inappropriate content through Google services.

International Society for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect

The International Society for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect (ISPCAN) focuses on training and education in the child protection field at a regional and international level. Childline is a member organisation of ISPCAN and is associated with ISPCAN training and international congresses, having assisted in the organisation of the ISPCAN International Congress held at the

Inkosi Albert Luthuli International Convention Centre The Inkosi Albert Luthuli International Convention Centre Complex often abbreviated as ICC Durban is a large events facility located in the city centre of Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. It is named after 1960 Nobel Peace Prize laureate and f ...

in 2008 in Durban. Childline has also had numerous papers accepted for presentation at the ISPCAN International Congresses, held every two years. The national coordinator of Childline is listed as a member of the expert faculty of ISPCAN, and also an elected member of the executive council of the organisation.

Child Helpline International

Child Helpline International (CHI) is a global network of 173 child helplines in 142 countries. Its functions are to provide a forum for information sharing and mutual support, assistance with advocacy and lobbying, promoting the rights of children and child helplines as a medium of assistance to children, and to support the initiation and development of child helplines in countries which do not have such services. Childline is partnered with Child Helpline International, and hosted the CHI Sixth International Consultation in 2012 in Durban.

Funding

Childline is primarily funded by ad hoc donations from corporations and government parastatals. The lack of a reliable source of recurring corporate and governmental donations has resulted in the threat of imminent closure of some Childline offices on several occasions.

References

External links

* {{official website, https://www.childlinesa.org.za/
South African Government: Call Centres and Help Lines
Children's charities based in South Africa 1986 establishments in South Africa Crisis hotlines