By Josfyn Uba
Mrs. Aderonke Oguntoyinbo is the matron in charge of Lions’ Motherless Babies Home, Lekki, 
Lagos. The home, jointly owned by Lions Club International and the Lagos State Ministry of Youth and Sports, has about 100 children at present. However, children are adopted from time to time.
In this interview with Daily Sun, recently in Lekki, Oguntoyinbo speaks on the basic requirements for adoption, legalisation and why the process is seemingly difficult, especially in Lagos State.
What would you say are the challenges of running this home?
It is mostly on the contributions to the education of the children. However, it is not much of a challenge because we have a scheme called the “Educate a Child Scheme,” where the public, schools and even individuals are expected to partner with the home to educate the children, and we have some infrastructures on ground and plans have been made to use them.
What is it like when a child is brought in here?
We get our children from different sources and backgrounds. Some are motherless, fatherless, orphans, others are brought in due to allegations of abuse. It could be physical, mental and even children that were used as slaves, housemaids and all kinds of abuses, as well as children of the destitute.
We don’t take children directly without the consent of the state government, because the home is jointly owned by Lions Club and Lagos State government, specifically, the Ministry of Youth and Sports. When a child is found from wherever, first, he is taken to the police station, where they obtain what is called a police extract.
This gives a brief history of the child, after which he is referred to a home like ours or any other home approved by the government.
When a child gets here, we carry out medical screening on him within 24 hours to make sure that he is fit to be kept here. We have about 100 children here. We also do physical screening to be sure that this is exactly the home for him or find other homes that are specifically meant for such a child. There are homes for different types of cases, some for mentally-challenged or physically-challenged and all sorts.
It is the duty of the social welfare officer here to determine where a child should go, depending on his defects, and if we don’t have the provision to take care of such a child, we duly send him to the appropriate home where he would fit in.
In this home, it is evident that there are teenagers, pre-teens and little ones. Why do you leave them here to grow to that level?
We do adoption, fostering and guardianship. Most people who adopt children often like to take them from zero year to five years old. They take them home, essentially, for bonding purposes such that they automatically becomes their own.
About two weeks ago, we gave out seven children for adoption; so, as people show interest, the children leave the home, but for children that have peculiar cases like allegations of abuse and other contentious issues, until the court decides, we cant just release them.
What of cases where the child is motherless but has a trace on paternity, what do you do?
We have had cases like that, where a father is unable to take care of the child. We would then sign an agreement with the father where he is given a certain period of time after which he would come back for the child.
It may be one, two years or whenever but he will finally take back his child because he knows that he would be able to cater for him. We had a case of twins like that. They were brought in here at birth. While here, their father was visiting. They knew him and had regular interface with him until the agreed time, he came back and took them because he could adequately cater for them at that time.
Have you ever had a case of adoption gone bad and a child returned to the home?
Yes, we have had one. A couple had adopted a child and we had complaints of physical abuse but they were passing the buck. Even when we did investigation, we couldn’t get the truth. No one agreed that he/she knew what happened or when it happened to the child. We had to withdraw him because we didn’t want to give out a child to unfit parents who can’t take care of children.
For grown-ups in the home, what do you do?
Right now, we have some grown-up children here. Some are in the university, while one is doing her National Youth Service Corps (programme).
Do the children sometimes stay with workers here?
No, we train them to be able to take care of the children as their parents. They go through training and counselling on how to properly take care of children. Like girls who get to puberty and adolescent stages are taught how to take care of themselves
On the issue of mentorship, we also have a lot of care-givers here. Naturally, care-givers have favourite children, we also have administrators that have favourites but not one-on-one that can take them home.
Could you relate a nasty experience you have had here?
No, I have never had any case like that because most prospective parents usually go through a lot of screening. People have even told me that the whole process of adoption in Lagos State is very difficult. I say, yes, why should it not be difficult? We are talking about a life here, the life of a child for that matter. It is not an item or a commodity that you can negotiate on.
For adoption in Lagos State, you have to go through the ministry, where you would be thoroughly screened. You don’t have to be rich to adopt a child but you have to be comfortable. You can be a female single parent.
Does one have to pay any money to adopt a child?
No, adoption is absolutely free.
What are some of the pre-requisites?
You have to be gainfully employed. You must have your tax clearance and be resident in Lagos. You can be a single adoptive parent, it doesn’t matter. You can also be married, but the law clearly states that a single female parent can only adopt a female child while married couples can adopt a child of either sex.
Why is this so?
It is essentially to prevent abuse. As an adoptive parent, you must provide a conducive environment because, for the child to come to an orphanage, naturally, he must have gone through difficulties so it will be unfair to take him/her through another unpleasant experience. But people always want the easy way to adoption. They want to take a child in just two months or even less. It is not so. There are very necessary administrative processes and screening that you must pass through. However, people are more aware about adoption now.
No, it seems people are not aware, as it is still not socio-culturally acceptable. What are you doing to create more awareness?
It is simple. Just go to the website and you would find out all it takes for you to adopt a child. You would also see all the options open to you.
Why are some children here left to grow into adolescence and adulthood without being adopted into proper families?
No, that’s a wrong perception because we do adoption all the time. The fact is that most people who want to adopt like to take in babies in this part of the world. In America, the fostering system, you don’t have to foster and the child automatically becomes your own. You could have a big house and foster as many children as you like because the state pays you to do that. In this part of the world, adoption is not yet socially acceptable, so people want a child that would belong to them. Here, the category of babies we have is far less that the big children. If I get a baby today, I would readily give it out but the list of prospective parents is too long. The last time it was done, we had about 230 applicants and it is done three times a year.
What is the last lap of adoption?
The home is the last lap in the sense that, once they get approval from the ministry, after going through counselling and screening, they would come to us, the home.
Where does the court come in?
The court comes in during the last screening and legalisation processes but, after the approval, they come to a home.
What is the duration for legalisation?
Legalisation occurs after six months.
What about your monitoring team?
There is a department for that and they do unannounced visits. We want our children to be adopted into a happy and loving environment. The monitoring officers even do it outside the country, in cases of international adoption.
Your advice to prospective parents seeking adoption?
My candid advice is that they have to be patient, because a lot of people complain that the processes are rigorous. We are dealing with lives here. They are not commodities that you can trade in and out. We don’t want to keep the kids here either. Much as we want to give them out, we also want them to be adopted into clean, happy and loving families. They have already gone through so much before coming to the home, so, it would be criminal if they are not properly taken care of in their new homes. When you take in a child, show him as much love as you would love to be loved. Remember all you have gone through before getting the child.
Do you have parents who have come repeatedly for children?
Yes, we have one or two cases like that.
Does adopting a child more than once make the process less cumbersome?
No, they still go through the same process but for them to come for another child, it means they are happy with the first one.