Dogs used for begging - is this cruelty?

Many people in Grahamstown have seen first hand the street children outside of Pick and Pay with thin, mangy puppies sitting next to them; a voice calls out asking for money to feed their dog.  This is a vicious circle- if you give them money, will they use it on the dog? If you give them dog food will it not perpetuate a cycle of using animals for this purpose of a bargaining chip? If you offer to buy the dog-to save it from its imminent death and lacking life-is this not again just perpetuating the problem?
This is my view on the subject and is not necessarily correct. Yes, these dogs may not to bred for the purpose of being income pawns, or they may be, but no matter how hard I try I cannot walk past one of these poor puppies and not give in and perpetuate the cycle. Yes-by giving them money for dog food you do just make it another way they can get money-and maybe it is the only way they can survive- but that is a whole different post! Feeding the dogs however, is a different story to me. How are the 'owners' of these animals benefitting from this? They are not receiving anything. So how can our feeding these animals be a bad thing? Maybe this is why the season of these street children and their dogs has passed-they were not making money off of it. The dogs they were using were benefitting more than they were.  Who knows what life was like for those animals- did they live better lives than strays? Yes- they had a human companion of sorts- but this may not necessarily have been a good thing. Did they have shelter or did they sleep outside like the other strays? I suppose this relationship must have been beneficial to them or they would have abandoned their human counterparts. I still see this using of the animals as cruelty. And yes, those other people and businesses who use animals for income and who treat them badly are criminals to my mind, (the circus, certain pet shops and animal testing...)
So-assuming these children did not breed these animals, but used strays which already existed in this state- did the animals benefit from this? Were they unable to leave the children's side? What happened to these puppies when they were no longer puppies? (Did you ever see an old dog with these children- we are attracted to the small and cute.) My heart tells me this trade is wrong, cruel-but my head asks why the dogs stayed. Maybe it's just the end of their usefulness which sickens me? The assumed end: as I have only heard stories and have not been an eye-witness.
Does anyone have another opinion?
Does anyone know what the truth is?


Here is the link to the Animal Protection Act of 1962. Please read it, paragraph 2.