June 2, 2009 - In response to some comments... The Director of Political Affairs has been signing out dossiers with passport approvals.
If you look at some of my older entries, you will see the steps that a file goes through in MOI.
What happens in MOI is that the Office of "Juritique" looks over all the original Haitian adoption related documents (that includes birth certificate of the child, death certificates of the parent(s) if applicable, the adoption decree, the minute de greffe, etc.).
Juritique looks for the authenticity of the documents and looks over the documents to ensure that there are no mistakes in the wording, but also looks for typographical/spelling errors.
Also, each document has to have the proper legalization stamps (i.e. from Parquet, Foreign Affairs) on it and either a half-page Archive certification document or a full-page Archive certification document has to replace a hand-written birth or death certificate and the adoption decree if the document is more than one year old.
Additionally, if a document is less than one year old, a letter of authenticity has to be obtained from the Ministry of Justice (that is a new step implemented about 6 months ago).
Apparently, MOI staff has found fake documents in adoption files. This is their job, to ensure that all documents are authentic and that the adoption was processed properly.
It can be frustrating because some of the documentation certifications can be time consuming to get. For example, a file may have a full page Archive in it already, but the MOI lawyer may not like what the document looks like, he/she may have questions regarding it authenticity. Thus, the lawyer may ask for a new Archive. That will add several weeks to the process.
Or, there can be a spelling error on the Archive, the name could be missppelled, so you get a new Archive and you discover that the name is spelled wrong again...and then there is the realization that the name is spelled wrong in the Log Book where the original document had been recorded....so now, you have to get a judgment from court to state that the mistake is in the Log Book and what the real spelling of the name is.
I do not think that anybody can realize just how difficult it is to work in an efficient manner down here. I think that only people who have spent time down here can appreciate the difficulty.
Haiti has an extreme amount of bureaucracy and it is mostly inefficient. However, I have always been impressed with the people who work inside of the Director of Political Affairs Office (the office where you go to find out what your file needs and to do the "interview" - filling out the information form on the adoptive, birth family and the child).
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3 comments:
Thank you for explaining these things. It nice to know that there may be a purpose with these long waiting times. We are just starting the IBESR, but several friends are already in MOI. It is really difficult to understand why it is so long to adopt from Haiti and it is even more difficult to explain familly and relatives that you "just" have to wait a year or more.
Bet Ellen
Thank you Vera,
Do you know of there is already some progress? Have they started to sign out files?
Greetings,
Sylvia van Rienderhoff
We were told today that the Director of MOI's sister passed away and not to expect him to sign any files out for at least this week. While this is terrible news, is there no one else that can do this job during his absence?(probably a silly question)
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