By David Donaldson | Project Leader
Adoption without a lawyer
Last year the government passed Republic Act R.A.11642, otherwise known the ‘Domestic Administrative Adoption and Alternative Care Act’, which now streamlines the process of adoption here in the Philippines.
All local adoptions in this country are processed by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) and in the past adoptive parents had to make the adoption legal by hiring a lawyer and going through the court system, which is notoriously slow, taking many months to complete and also very expensive.
Under this new process, everything will now be done through the DSWD by a new department called the National Authority for Child Care (NACC), so they will complete the legal adoption paperwork, saving a lot of time and money for the adoptive parents. This will also encourage more people to consider adoption as there are still many children looking for a new family.
This new act will also reduce the number of illegal adoptions here in the Philippines, something that continues to be a big problem; parents making false birth certificates or mothers giving their newborn babies away to someone. The DSWD now insists on all adoptions being done legally through the NACC and will take into custody a child from someone who has not followed the new law. That is how a one-month-old baby boy arrived in Angel House last November and our social worker will now follow the legal process for the safety of the child.
Your donations help us to rescue these illegally adopted children as well as newborns that are abandoned in the street and neglected kids that need our loving care and protection. We consider the new law to be a positive step in making the adoption process faster and less expensive for adoptive parents here in the Philippines.
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