Wife of the Vice-President, Mrs. Oludolapo Osinbajo, had advocated the need to speak out against the stigma attached to child adoption.
Osinbajo said this at the First Annual Conference of Heritage Adoption Support and Advocacy Group in Lagos with the theme, ‘The Power of Adoption.’
She said, “Identifying the problem (stigma attached to adoption) is great but not enough, speaking about it is better but it still not enough.
“Don’t let us stop there but let us go one step ahead, let us act on what we have heard.
“So many areas have potential to change for the better and the questions begging for answer is: would you join the army? The army, that chooses to fight the negativity that surrounded adoption.
“I implore you to choose to speak up. I believe we can speak up; we can lend our voices that clearly we are desperately in need of strengthening the structure that are around the issues of adoption.”
Panelists at the conference included a representative from UNICEF, Wilfred Mamah, Bridget Itsueli. Bami Obasanya; the Chief Welfare Officer, Child Adoption and Fostering Unit of the Ministry of Youth and Social Welfare, Lagos State, Oluwatoyin Kotun and a Veteran actress, Joke Silva.
Mamah, who spoke on ‘Adopt a child, save a nation,’ noted that 17.5 million children were abandoned in Nigeria and that every child must be given an opportunity to thrive.
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