Published In The Newspapers here~

Press Release

Ministry of Health, and Ministry of Justice Denied My Children A Golden Opportunity

An Aggrieved Father The father of the three children the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare illegally removed from the compound of the West African Child Support Network (WACSN) Mr. Randall Keculah ----says Acting Minister of Justice, Cllr. Eva Mappy Morgan has denied his children their ever life time golden opportunity that may never come their way again.Upon the directives of Acting Minister Morgan, he said his children were stopped from leaving the country at the Roberts International Airport (RIA) on grounds that the ministry did not give them a final clearance for departure. He said, in keeping with law and required legal procedures governing adoption, he and his late wife relinquished their 4 children to WACSN to be adopted under a court degree, which was later climaxed with an interview for visa at the United States Embassy, noting that the effort of the WACSN and the adoptive parents were wasted owing to the action of Acting Minister Morgan who singlehandedly ordered security officers at the RIA to stop his children from entering the plane for departure to the United States. Addressing himself to the rather unfortunate situation in a chat with reporters yesterday, Mr. Keculah indicated that because of the action of the Acting Justice Minister, the adopted parents have refused to accept the children due to the behavior of government officials and the length of time it has taken to resolve the situation before the President announced the ban on adoption.Mr. Keculah, a father of seven children, said the mother of the children died in child birth with their last child who was one of the children denied leaving Liberia, “after completing all necessary paperwork in compliance with Liberian Adoption Laws. This Process included approval from the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, and the granting of a decree by the Probate Court of Liberia.In a press statement issued today, Mr. Keculah was quoted as saying that an independent investigation to establish the biological parenthood of the children was conducted by the US Embassy thereby allowing WACSN to put in place its customary practice of inviting the adopting parents to Liberia to spend three weeks to bond with the children. Mr. Keculah stressed that a required interview with the US Embassy was scheduled to complete the adoption process after which, the three Liberian children were then issued visas for travel to the United States by the US Embassy with their adoptive parents. While at the airport, the children were cleared by Liberian Immigration officers at the Roberts International Airport. The three children were then stopped with their adoptive parents from boarding the plane by Minister Eva Morgan who insisted that another clearance for departure was required before the children could depart Liberia. In this process, the children were denied travelling to America, while their adoptive parents looked on and felt insulted, embarrassed, and belittled.“A sad end to this story of the three boys now ends in a tragedy, with their future compromised and their father left in a state of bewilderment. The Ministry of Health and Social Welfare illegally removed them from the WACSN Compound without a court order and placed them with street children at the Don Bosco Home,” the traumatized father of the children said. “Keep in mind that many of these children have been in WACSN’s care for the past three to five years attending private school and being cared for by doctors at the Saint Joseph Catholic Hospital. The tragedy of this situation is the adoptive parent in America has said that they do not want to adopt the children any longer because of the behavior of government officials,” Mr. Keculah is quoted as saying in the press statement. According to Mr. Keculah, the action of the Acting Justice Minister is something he will never forget ever in his life. “The Minister is a mother and good thing she took her children to the airport to travel to America, when she took that decision t prevent my children from going where her children is. Now my children are at the Don Bosco Home for street children a place where nobody wants their children to be, who knows such opportunity may never come to my children again”, he told reporters. Meanwhile Judge James Zota of Criminal Court “A” has found the Health and Social Welfare Ministry guilty for illegally removing the children from the WACSN compound without a court order.