It has been quite the roller coaster of a day. Tidbits of positive news have been trickling in since yesterday, but the U.S. Embassy did not send out their official adoption notice until this evening. The good news is that 62 Congolese orphans get to come home. This is the first time adopted children are being allowed to leave Congo since last fall. The bad news is that the rest of the children are not coming home now. There are hundreds of adopted children in Congo who have parents in the United States waiting for them, but only 15 of those are being allowed out of Congo. [The rest of the 62 children are going home to other countries.]
The remaining hundreds of children and their families now have to wait for Congo to re-write their adoption laws. Nobody knows how long this will take or what will be in them, but we are all required to adhere to whatever they may say (even those of us with finalized adoptions!). No timeframe was presented at all. This is getting really ridiculous. This morning we thought things were starting to move again because a few families were receiving exit permits, but now we realize that is not the case. Congo just wanted to get rid of a few of the oldest adoption cases before continuing to hold the rest of our children hostage while starting the process of writing new laws. I guess we just continue on with no timeframes and no promises while we wait for this never- ending adoption to finally come to an end.
"Your" kids aren't yet yours -- they're Congolese citizens who cannot leave DRC without the Congolese government's explicit permission!
ReplyDeleteDespite being "adopted on paper" you're an American and the kid is congolese!
You might wanna consider that Jesus doesn't want you to acquire that kid!!
To Susan's comment above: 1) It was established by the Congolese that no one in the Congo wants Roland. 2) Matt and Cassandra have been providing for Roland's care for many months now. No one else is. Including you. 3) The Taylors have been doing everything according to law, both U.S. and Congolese. Who, therefore deserves to have him?
ReplyDeleteWhat do you suggest? Just let him go on through life without parental care? Or maybe you are too racist to understand what love is and does.
What would Jesus do?
-Ron H.
#1 DRC is among the poorest countries in the world, has a barely functioning government that isn't able to provide clean water and electricity to it's citizens, let alone social services. Those practically non-existent Congolese social services? Are responsible for determining if Roland (and all Congolese kids that are being adopted by foreigners) is truly an orphan in need of a foreign family, and simply doesn't have the capacity to do so.
ReplyDeleteThe State Dept's been publishing alerts/warnings about fraud/corruption and delays in DRC adoptions since at least 2011 -- the exit permit suspension and delays due to corruption?
#2 Matt and Cassandra are spending $500-600/month on foster care fees for Roland in a country where per capita income is maybe $600/year. Cost of living/food/medicine is much lower in DRC than in the US... you're naive if you think folks in DRC aren't profiting from $600/month in cold hard "foster" cash!
http://kitumaini.blogspot.com/2014/02/orphanage-donations-child-finder-fees.html
" Applications for exit permits for adopted children are facing increased scrutiny following reports of an apparently falsely backdated bordereau letter submitted by a U.S. family. The DGM reported that a number of additional applications appear to include fraudulently-obtained documentation as well. The Ministers stressed that adoptive parents “must be patient” as the DGM is reviewing applications thoroughly and cannot predict when exit permits may be issued"
http://adoption.state.gov/country_information/country_specific_alerts_notices.php?alert_notice_type=alerts&alert_notice_file=democratic_republic_of_congo_6
Cassandra and Matt's cash provides the financial incentive for unscrupulous folks to traffic/kidnap Congolese kids WITH families that love & wanna raise them to foreign adopters for profit!
Google "48 Hours: Perilous Journey" for an up close and personal look at horrific fraud and corruption by Sue Hedberg, of "Finding Fernanda" investigative journalism infamy. Or google "Karen Abigail Anyeli" for a horrifying story of a kidnapped Guatemalan girl Hedberg spirited away to the US (and whose biomom wants her back!).
#3 Despite being "adopted on paper" by the Taylor's, Roland is presently a Congolese citizen only. He cannot become a US citizen until he steps on US soil. The US govt cannot make DRC issue a Congolese citizen an exit permit. DRC is a sovereign nation-- it doesn't EVER have to issue him an exit permit,
What would Jesus do?
My Jesus would not approve of kidnapping kids with poor families and selling them to richer foreigners.
My Jesus would not demand the US govt (my govt) to pressure DRC (or any other country) to expedite the adoption of a child who is very likely to have been trafficked!
My Jesus would insist the provenance of each and every Congolese kid in an orphanage, reunite them with their family/extended family of possible, provide assistance to reunite families if warranted, and then find local families to adopt the kids who are legitimately orphaned. Really, really try before putting a Congolese kid up for international adoption.
My Jesus believes in helping "widows and orphans", not just snatching orphans.
My Jesus doesn't see poverty, and poverty alone, as a reason to relinquish a beloved child -- because "give the kid to foreigner or else he dies" isn't truly a choice:
Http://pearltobefound.wordpress.com/2014/04/13/shattered-families-part-two-what-i-propose/
My Jesus would recognize that there are 4 million SINGLE orphans in DRC -- kids with one LIVING birthparent. "Single orphans" in the US aren't called orphans -- they're "kids raised by a single mom" and "kids raised by a single dad".
Susan,
DeleteYou have posted a lot of misinformation about U.S. adoptions from the Democratic Republic of Congo. Therefore I will respond to the points that you listed in your last post.
#1: The DRC is not responsible for determining if the children adopted by U.S. citizens are truly orphans in need of a foreign family. The U.S. Department of State conducts investigations on all children in the DRC that are adopted by U.S. families. These investigations consist of face to face interviews with the family of the child (if there is any family still alive). If there is no family alive then the US State department conducts interviews at the orphanage where the child was dropped off and they interview the person who dropped off the child. This is a very thorough process that ensures that the children are truly in need of new parents.
In addition there is no financial incentive for Orphanages to kidnap children and claim that they are orphaned because the orphanages don’t get any money from the adoptions.
#2: We are not spending money on foster care fees. We are paying our US based adoption agency to run a group home in the DRC that takes care of our child before we can bring him home to the US. The group home is run entirely by our adoption agency under the influence of us and the other adoptive parents. The government of the DRC gets none of the money that we send over for our child’s care.
The reason why we have to spend so much on our child’s care is because things are more expensive in the DRC, not cheaper. Clean water, healthy safe food, medical care, decent clothes, diapers etc… are all less available in DRC than in the U.S. and therefore they are more expensive. The only person who profits off of the money that we send over is our son who has a better standard of living than most people in the DRC because of our money.
#3: The government of DRC has given us full legal custody over our son. The fact that he is still a Congolese citizen does not diminish that fact. It is true that they don’t have to ever issue our son an exit letter. They also didn’t have to declare us his parents, but they did anyway.
To sum things up this is not an issue of buying a child. This was an adoption of child who had no parents. Now he has us. Unless you have any evidence that the trained U.S. Department Of State investigators did not find then stop commenting on my wife’s blog about how this is not a legit adoption. If you have any questions about the adoption process in the DRC then feel free to ask.
-Matthew
#1 The US is responsible for determining if a Congolese kid is legitimately orphaned and this eligible to be adopted by a US family?
DeleteIt's news to the State Dept's "Who can be adopted" section. You should tell them to update their website, since you know better!!
http://adoption.state.gov/country_information/country_specific_info.php?country-select=democratic_republic_of_congo
#2 Because no US agency has and/or it's locally engaged staff have never done anything illegal/unethical for profit. The State Dept arrested IAG & CCI staffers for fun, shut down Guat for sport. Suuuuure.
(It's locally engaged staff, not the Congolese govt, who likely profit from the $500-600/mo -- equivalent of a full year's salary in DRC! -- incentive to snatch kids w/families for profit!!)
#3 That would be the same Congolese government that announced it hasn't started updating it's adoption laws, doesn't know how long it'll take and has warned folks that they may or may not allow the completed-on-paper adoptions to go through.
(If you were truly meant to adopt a Congolese kid, dontchathink he'd be home by now? Maybe that in and of itself is a message?!??)
I'll pray the laws take ages to change, that your referral gets reunited with his first fam or an adoptive family that will actually love and afford to properly care for him w/o begging cash from strangers!!