HANCI Refutes Allegations of Child Trafficking

Help the Needy Child International (HANCI) has come under constant pressure by parents whose children were adopted by a United States based organization called Maine Adoption Placement Services (MAPS) a deal believed to have been facilitated by HANCI.
The parents claim that their children were adopted by parents in the US without their consent. On a BBC Net Work Africa Program broadcast on Wednesday 4th November 2009, one of the aggrieved parents who was in tears, demanded that she needed to see her child revealing that she had never signed a document with anybody for adopting her child.
The Executive Director of Help the Needy Child International (HANCI), Dr. Roland Kargbo on Wednesday this week refuted allegations of child trafficking as alleged by the parents. Explaining the legal ramifications of the said adoption case, Dr. Kargbo noted that:
“When HANIC started this operation in Makeni in 1996, a centre was opened for war orphans and abandoned children. This led to the building of an orphanage the same year at the back-of –Birch Memorial Secondary School in Makeni.
When MAPS joined us, we started another orphanage at number three Mission Road in Makeni for children whose parents or guardians wanted them to be adopted overseas, United States to be specific.”   
Dr.Roland Kargbo further explained that: “the home had 33 children but only 23 of them whose adoptions were facilitated by HANCI with the consent of their parents were adopted.” He said it was made clear to the parents that all the 33 children who were kept in the orphanage were kept there for adoption. Dr. Kargbo further explained that each parent completed and signed a document to the effect adding that the agreement was taken to the magistrate court in Makeni for clearance and supervision. He revealed that the said documents were in their possession opened for inspection by interested members of the public.
The Executive director of HANCI pointed out that: “the Ministry of Social Welfare Gender and Children’s Affairs did the adoption; we merely facilitated the links between the biological parents and the parents who wanted to do the adoption. The ministry has addresses of the children and should be able to provide updates about their welfare.”
However, the Ministry of Social Welfare Gender and Children’s had earlier revealed that it would reserve all comments as it was currently investigating the matter.
It added that the said adoptions occurred at a time when they were not in governance and there had recently been a change of minister in the ministry.
Meanwhile, the question of adoption in the ordinary lay Sierra Leonean person’s point of view would be interpreted as a way of helping a parent to raise his or her child for a specific period, with the biological parent reserving the sole parental rights of the child.
This would simply imply that an illiterate parent wanting his or child to be adopted because of poverty would probably fail to grasp the legal implications of what it means to give up a child for adoption.
The question now is would there ever be any hope for the aggrieved parents to see or perhaps just hear from their children who now dwell in America?
By Abdul Samba Brima