Thembelihle Home is a Place of Safety. As the name implies, it is a safe house, a temporary home, providing critical love, care and rehabilitation for abused and abandoned children and youth 6-16 years.

Thembelihle Home is a registered Not-for-Profit (NPO) organisation and receives a government subsidy for 20 children who are referred for admission by Police or Social Workers as a result of abuse, or to remove them from abusive situations. However, Thembelihle Home seldom has 20 children and on occasions even staff have to vacate their beds to accommodate new admissions who simply cannot be turned away.

Thembelihle’s role is not just to meet the necessary requirements of the children for shelter, food and clothing – basic necessities of life which many of the children and young people have been denied.

It's mission is to:

·         Provide for the psychological needs of the children for love, care, stability, constancy and security;

·         Develop the social, coping and leadership skills of the children and young people through play, group work, sharing, recreation and sport;

·         Maintain the children’s cultural heritage through language, song and dance;

·         Work with children’s social workers to ensure best care for them while they are at the Home and to secure the best future arrangements either for return to family or to foster families.

Thembelihle Home is not just a residential facility providing 24 hour, all year round care. It also provides home schooling for the children. Because the very nature of a Place of Safety is that it is a safe house, where children can be protected and feel secure, the option of attending local schools is denied them during the time they are under the protection of Thembelihle and social services. Home schooling ensures not only coverage of the national education curriculum, but also age-appropriate life skills and personal development.

The Director is Miss Pumeza Mqhayi, an energetic and vibrant woman who is a trained teacher. She is supported in managing the home by local woman who are employed as house mothers. Thembelihle is also fortunate to have a link with Project Trust, a UK based organisation that selects and places young volunteers for twelve months in developing countries. These volunteers (two per year) dedicate a year of their lives to come to Thembelihle to advance the education and development of the children – through classroom assistance plus all the extra-curricular activities they initiate.

Thembelihle Home’s government subsidy is modest. It contributes to the costs of running the home, but falls well short of meeting these needs in full. Thembelihle, as with most NPO’s in South Africa, relies heavily on the generosity of local, national and international donations and benefactors.

Thembelihle Home is a small NPO with very few overheads and fixed costs. Help and support for Thembelihle goes direct to those who need it and will benefit from it – the children and young people – South Africa’s future leaders, professionals, community drivers, parents and citizens.