Children council rejects adoption age

The National Commission of Children (NCC) has opposed a string of proposals in the draft law on child adoption. Appearing before Parliament’s standing Committee on Political Affairs and Gender debating the Bill governing persons and family, Sylvestre Hitimana, the NCC lawyer, highlighted concerns, especially on Article 280 on minimum age for adoption. It states that no one shall be allowed to adopt a child unless he or she is 18 years old. The clause adds that potential adoptive parent must be at least three years older than the child. But Hitimana argued that at 18, one is too immature. He said: “We are saying that this [18 years] is too low an age, and a person hasn’t really embarked on a firm path in life. The right age should, at least, be 25 years.”He also expressed objection to Article 293 which in part states that if an intended adoptive parent dies before court grants an adoption order, court shall proceed with the application and the adoption shall have legal effect as if the intended adoptive parent is alive.“This isn’t in order because the intended adoptive parent is dead yet it is him or her who had wished to adopt,” he said. The council’s memo presented to the Committee on Thursday also opposes a proposal requiring a married prospective adoptive parent to seek consent of his or her spouse before taking on a child. MPs recently traversed the country to consult about amendments to the 1998 law. They were reportedly warned to be “very careful” not to pass clauses that will make Rwandan children completely cutting ties with their homeland. Another sticky issue in the Bill concerns the term “absolute adoption” as a new option. The Bill defines absolute adoption as a legal relationship between a child and non-biological parents where the child completely ends ties with his or her original family. Violating rightsMPs, NCC and the general public fear that this reform of adoption could violate rights of adopted children instead of improving it. “All the people we talked to indicated that this issue [adoptee cutting ties with original family] is very serious,” Committee Chairperson Alfred Kayiranga said.He said respondents argued that because of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, some Rwandan children were taken to foreign countries illegally, and if absolute adoption is approved, these children will be lost completely. “People indicated that we must be very careful. People are concerned.” The 1988 law only provides for simple adoption where the one basic requirement which is a 15-year age difference between the adoptee and the adopter, Jean Pierre Kayitare, the assistant Attorney General in charge of Legislation Drafting Services in the Ministry of Justice explained. This legal undertaking allows the continuity of relationship between the child and its first family. Kayitare warned that simple adoption “has consequences to the adoptee because they have no rights” to the adopter’s property. “This is a problem, and secondly, this child continues to have rights on the family of origin yet, probably, it exists no more, like we have seen in Rwanda,” he added. Kayitare said the ‘absolute adoption’ clause was informed by views suggesting that the adopter becomes a parent completely. “A child should come to a new family and enjoy equal rights as other children. The child can inherit, and this is really helpful to the child. It is called absolute adoption.” It was also decided that the law should be amended to “have another option of international adoption” since Rwanda ratified international conventions including the 1993 Convention on the protection of children and collaboration in international adoption. Kayitare said care was taken to include “necessary strict conditions so that there first be a child’s consent, and consent from pertinent authorities and institutions, to avoid situations where people could just come to scramble for children to take abroad.”