The "Yalla Kafala" campaign was started by a woman on social media

Egypt: Families, single women and divorced women open their homes to orphans

• Egypt has expanded the rules on adoption in hopes of making it more widespread and gaining social acceptance.

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Egyptian Yasmine El-Habal had wanted for years to sponsor an orphan child, but she did so only last year, after the Egyptian government relaxed the regulations regarding who could do so, and organized a campaign to change public opinion trends, which enabled her to introduce the "Ghalia" baby to Her home.

The official adoption whereby the family of a child is adopted, gives him its name, and makes him a legitimate heir to it, is forbidden in Islam, due to the lack of mixing of lineages, and it is not applied in Egypt, despite the encouragement of people to care for or sponsor children.

These complications prevented some people from adopting children, and instead chose to sponsor children who remained in orphan care homes completely.

However, in January 2020, Egypt expanded the rules for who can adopt a child, to include single women over the age of 30 and divorced women, and lowered the minimum requirement for education, in the hope that an increase in the pool of potential adoptive parents will make adoption more widespread and gain social acceptance.

Facing society

The "Yalla Kafala" campaign, which encourages social media to take children home and spend on them, and initiated by an Egyptian woman, has helped make a difference.

Yasmine Al-Habal (40 years old), who was not married, had always dreamed of having a daughter, and said that she faced social pressure when she chose to take care of "Ghalia", who is now seven months old.

"My companion is what remains, you will face the community how, and tell them what?"

Medicine, you will know it, well, you will know them, medicine if someone says a hurtful word to you, if someone hurts it, if you don’t know what.

You know the people's point of view. ”

Yasmine assured her friends that she would respond by informing people that their biased views were wrong. She said that she would tell "Ghalia" that it did not matter where she came from.

And she said, “I told them in principle that the people's point of view is wrong, so I mean, I have a million thousand responses to a million thousand needs possible. Anyone who says it, and whoever hates his brain, I mean, why do we make a mistake in a child like this? ».

Regarding what she will tell "Ghalia", she added, "I will say it. You already made a difference in the world. Your presence is important no matter where you started."

What is important is that you and your presence made a positive difference in the lives of many powerful people. ”

She explained that she has witnessed a change in attitudes towards adoption, and her experience encourages others to apply.

She went on to say, “The happiest moments of my life when I showed up on the page a message from someone who is when we saw the page.

Hey .. we did like that. ”

Find homes

Reem Amin, a member of the Alternative Families Committee at the Egyptian Ministry of Social Solidarity, said that its main goal is to eliminate the need for orphanages by 2025. "The main goal of the orphanage is to be a stopping point before the child moves to the care home."

Mohamed Omar, the legal advisor to the ministry, said that about 11,600 families have taken orphans since January 2020, and that there are 11,000 other orphans in need of homes.

In the second half of 2020, with the start of easing restrictions related to the Corona pandemic, the Ministry of Solidarity received 1,000 requests from families wishing to take care of orphans.

Mohamed Abdullah and his wife, who live in Cairo, initially failed to conceive a child, so they decided instead to sponsor an orphan.

Months later, Abdullah's wife, Mirna, became pregnant, and they are now raising their son, Suleiman, with their son, on bail, "Daoud."

Abdullah said, "I am all of them, that he is a father and a mother. They loved them both, and it was an opportunity that they both lived together."

11600

A family has taken orphans since January 2020, and 11,000 orphans are still in need of homes.

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