Duterte Admin Supports Legal Adoption Campaign “Spread Unconditional Love Through Legal Adoption”

Interior and Local Government Secretary Ismael “Mike” D. Sueno enjoins all Local Chief Executives (LCEs) to support the Legal Adoption Campaign to ensure nationwide awareness of the growing number of orphaned, abandoned or neglected Filipino children in need of alternative wholesome family environment.

In a directive, Sec. Sueno urges Governors and Mayors to undertake activities to encourage adoptive families to undergo legal adoption in order to protect the welfare of adopted children from discrimination.

“Local execs should take the lead in strengthening the adoption advocacy campaign in order to safeguard the welfare and protection of every child,” he said.

Some of the activities that LCEs may spearhead are hanging of streamers, posters, and other information materials in conspicuous places and conduct of briefing on Legal Adoption Campaign during the flag raising ceremony.

Sec. Sueno also directed all DILG Regional Directors and Field Officers to cause the widest dissemination of the said issuance to all local government units (LGUs) and others concerned within their respective jurisdictions.

This year’s celebration carries the theme “Pagmamahal Palaganapin, Legal na Pag-aampon Ating Gawin!” or “Spread Unconditional Love through Legal Adoption”.

The declaration of the month of February as the Adoption Consciousness Month is in line with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), a legally-binding international agreement setting out the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights of every child, regardless of their race, religion or abilities.

A report from the United Nations’ Children’s Rights & Emergency Relief Organization says that about 1.8 million children in the Philippines or more than 1% of its entire population are “abandoned or neglected.”

Source: DILG.Gov