Durban - A Verulam Children’s Court magistrate under fire for his refusal to authorise the adoption of a 2-year-old child by a Canadian couple says there is a “racist motive and commercial interests” behind this.
He insists that the child should be removed from the foster home where he has been living since his mother abandoned him at 15 days old in a pit latrine, and that attempts should be made to “reunite him” with his maternal grandmother.
Read: SA baby's chance at new life in Canada foiled
Magistrate Vallaraman Kathuravaloo on Wednesday filed an affidavit in opposition to the finalisation of an interim order obtained recently in the Durban High Court by foster mother Ruth Grobler, allowing her to keep the child.
She alleges that when the adoption application came before the magistrate, he insisted the granny come to court.
When she did, he simply asked her if she wanted the child, and when she said yes, ordered that the child be handed over to her.
The mother of the child, now apparently living with her in Lusikisiki, was also present.
Grobler, in her affidavit, alleged that Kathurvaloo had a history of opposing inter-country adoptions, and in 2010 made allegations that they were nothing more than “child trafficking”.
Read: 50 kids left in limbo by Canada/SA trafficking row
This allegation - which resulted in Canada refusing to allow adoptions from South Africa for three years - was investigated and found to be unfounded.
But the magistrate says he, as the “whistle-blower”, was never interviewed.
Referring to a report by Durban advocate Sarah Jane Linscott - who was appointed by a court at the time as a curatrix to represent the interests of six children in the process of being adopted by Canadian couples - he said it was a “worthless piece of biased information from someone who is clearly pro-adoption”.
“The report was only used to influence the director of public prosecutions, not to prosecute anyone when clear evidence existed that child trafficking was being perpetrated in the guise of legitimate adoptions.”
The magistrate also denied making any order giving the child to the granny, saying he had merely “recommended this”, and had Grobler and social workers come to court the next day, as they had been asked to do, he would have listened to their concerns.
“This is an unwarranted attack on my integrity and competence as a judicial officer,” he said. “Grobler is wailing and gnashing her teeth that I want to return the child to a mother that wanted to murder him. I deny that.”
Although social workers' reports at the time the child was abandoned said the biological father was unknown, the magistrate indicated he had now had contact with him “and he has informed me he wants his child and there are no allegations against him”.
The magistrate said he believed “commercial interests” were too high in inter-country adoptions for “common sense to stand in the way”, and claimed that according to a website of a Canadian adoption agency, the cost could be R500 000 a child.
“These financial interests need to be investigated. The interim order should be discharged,” he said.
The adoption proceedings are on hold and the child will remain with Grobler until the application comes back to court in October, the earliest date on the court roll.
The Mercury