At the Union Buildings, campaigners stood together for South Africa’s most vulnerable, calling for baby savers to be protected and not criminalised.
Pretoria, South Africa (30 October 2025) – Activists, child protection organisations, and members of Baby Savers South Africa united on the lawns of Pretoria’s Union Building for a peaceful protest on Friday, in a plea to stop the proposed criminalisation of baby savers.
A memorandum has been handed over to the Presidency that urges government to scrap amendments to the Children’s Act that would classify babies left in these facilities as ‘abandoned’ and their use as a criminal act.
Baby Savers SA and allied organisations argue that this change could cost lives, as these facilities offer a life-saving alternative in a country where unsafe abandonment remains tragically common.
“Declaring baby savers illegal will increase the risk to newborns and other vulnerable infants,” says Georgina Caetano of Just in Time. “Therefore, we asked the President to intervene and acknowledge the reality in this country, where children continue to be found in toilets, dustbins, open fields, etc,” she adds, as per The Citizen.
The Department of Social Development’s stance is that baby savers deny children the right to family and cultural heritage, and remove responsibility from parents, maintaining that children shouldn’t be separated from their roots without due process.
Activists have countered by making the point that criminalising safe surrender systems does not address the desperate circumstances faced by many mothers, often victims of rape, gender-based violence, or severe poverty in SA.
They warn that outlawing baby savers will not stop abandonment, it will only push it into more dangerous, hidden spaces.
As the deadline for public comment on the draft Children’s Amendment Bill closed this weekend, campaigners remain hopeful that their voices, and the lives of vulnerable infants, will be heard at the highest office.
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