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"HOW are you supposed to live?" asks Pam Laubscher, a terminal brain cancer patient who was not able to claim grant money because she has been waiting almost a year for her identity document from the Department of Home Affairs.

Laubscher says that she has been surviving on hand-outs since she applied for her ID at the Wynberg office in March 2007.

"I was told that it would take three months."

Laubscher then received her temporary ID (which she could not use to claim her grant from the Department of Social Services), but when that expired, she still had no permanent documentation.

She was told that there was a problem with her fingerprints, and went back a second time to have them captured.

That was only the beginning of a series of trips and a plethora of phone calls that she made to the office.

"It is like trying to phone Mars," she says.

She was also told that her ID would be couriered to her house because it was so urgent ? something that never happened.

Laubscher eventually received her ID on 13 February 2008, but says she cannot claim back the years' worth of money that she missed out on.

Hers is only one of the nume?rous complaints that People's Post has received about appalling ser?vice delivery from the Department of Home Affairs in Wynberg.

"Is this called service?

"I wonder if our leaders in government obtain their documents in the same way?"

Another person said the department is "useless" after waiting several months for her passport, and not getting any answer when phoning the office. When a reporter visited the office, she spoke to several people who had been queuing for hours.

One even had to take the day off from work to bring his daughter to the office for the lengthy pro?cess of applying for her identity document. Another just looked hopeless when asked how long he thought he would wait for the ID he had come to apply for.

When employees of the Wynberg Home Affairs office noticed that there was a reporter in the building, she was hauled to an office without any explanation before being bundled out of the building by security personnel - after offering to speak to the ma?nager to explain her presence.

The department's handling of a media enquiry reflected the inertia and sluggishness the public has come to associate with Home Affairs. People's Post wanted comment on dysfunctional operations, possible solutions and a suggested time-frame for when these solutions might be implemented, but our questions remain unanswered after a month of trying.

Queries were sent to the acting chief director of communications, Jacky Mashapu, as well as Mavuso Msimang, the Director-General of the department.

As no answers were forthco?ming from the department, it is unclear when, how or if the problems at the Wynberg office of the Department of Home Affairs will ever be solved.

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