The National Social Protection Agency (NSPA) has announced that it will introduce allowances for foster parents.
Chairperson of NSPA Ibrahim Waheed said that Rf500 would be provided to registered parents and Rf1000 for registered children every month.
”Any person who has a written document from the court that a person is taking care of a orphan child is admissible,” Waheed said. ”We consider as anyone under the age of eighteen to be a child.”
Waheed said that Rf500 would be provided for each kid a person looked after.
”No matter the number of children one person looks after, we will give Rf 500 per kid,” said Waheed.
Waheed said that the purpose of introducing the foster parent allowances was to encourage people to take care of orphans.
”There are many children in ‘Kudakudhinge Hiya’ [orphanage in Villingili],” he said. “We want to encourage people to take them and look after those kids,” he said.
He said that more than 2000 applicants had already applied, ”but some of them do not have the court warrant,” he said,” so we have asked them to bring it along with the application.”
Moreover, Ibrahim Waheed said that allowances for single mothers will be available from the 15th of this month.
He said that every single mother registered would receive Rf1000 per child under the age of eighteen.
He noted that each mother would receive Rf3000 maximum.
”Even if they had more than three kids, we could only provide Rf3000 each month,” he said. ”Currently the judicial system will provide them with Rf450 every month from the kids’ fathers, so Rf3000 is better than what they can get through the judicial system.”
He said that all single mothers can apply with a court warrant, whether they are widowed or divorced.
NGOs inluding Hand-in-Hand, Rights for All and Care Society said that they did not have enough information on the Forster parent allowance and did not comment.