NATIONAL NEWS - The Western Cape minister of social development, Albert Fritz, condemned the steamrolling of recent amendments to Sections 249 and 259 of the Children's Act of 2005. These amendments make it illegal for anyone to charge fees for professional adoptive services; putting a halt to adoptions both in South Africa and overseas. 

"I call on the national minister, Susan Shabangu, to urgently review the amendments in light of the many concerns voiced by the adoptive community," he said.

Adoptions effectively halted
Fritz said in effect only state social workers, who are already inundated with cases and untrained in adoptions, would be authorised to facilitate adoptions. "Accredited child protection organisations, adoptive social workers, lawyers, psychologists, and other associated professionals will not be able to charge for their expertise, not even to reclaim costs." 

This will not only increase the workload of state social workers, it will also eliminate an entire industry that facilitates the majority of adoptions and employs countless professionals including private social workers, medical professionals, adoption agencies, psychologists, immigration specialists, and many others. Social workers will not have the time to facilitate adoptions and the cost of expertise will place too great a burden on the state. 

Currently there are 3,7-million orphaned and vulnerable children in our country, he said, and we cannot afford to eliminate this successful form of child protection.

In short, he said, adoptions in South Africa will grind to a halt.

Little time for comment
Katinka Pieterse, the chairperson of the National Adoption Coalition of South Africa (Nacsa), said the adoptive community had just one week to make written submissions regarding the amendments, as they were only included in the third gazetted amendment on 29 October 2018 and the first dialogue around the changes only took place during the National Child Protection Forum from 21 to 22 November. It is worrying that the amendments have been passed as a Bill. "However, the Bill has not yet been enacted as there are various court cases challenging the amended sections regarding adoption."

Problematic
Fritz said there exists a systemic bias within the national department of social development, resulting in adoptions being kept relatively low when compared to other forms of alternative care. 

"This amendment will further ensure the number of adoptions halts to zero." Furthermore, Section 32 of the amendment makes the insertion problematic. This insertion can give permission to the provincial head of social development that allows the exercising of parental responsibilities and rights by a person other than the parents caring for the child. 

"This may cause conflict with previous court rulings on parental authority and in turn, this could undermine the independence of the judiciary and of our democracy as a whole."

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