Nigeria and Norway are locked in a battle over the custody of a one-year old baby boy of Nigerian parentage.
Baby George, who was born to a Nigerian man and woman, Queen Agho, has been in the custody of Norwegian Child Welfare Authority since April 30, 2014, 18 days after his birth.
Norway is notorious for seizing children of immigrants under flimsy excuses and giving them out to foster homes.
In documents made available to journalist, the Norwegian authorities were said to have taken away the baby on the allegation that the mother was mentally ill and could not make emotional contact with the baby. It was also gathered that Queen Agho was forcefully taken to a psychiatric hospital, under police escort, in Leirfjord, Norway, where she was examined, but later released as mentally sound.
In a letter dated September 18, 2013, to the Norway Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Nigeria Embassy in Sweden, which oversees consular issues in Norway, complained that several threats were made to Queen Agho to cooperate with Norwegian authorities and give up her baby and when she refused, the allegation of mental illness was brought up.
The embassy wrote, “Further reasons adduced for the seizure of the baby were that there was an absence of emotional connection between the mother and child, as well as the lack of eye contact.”
It noted that there has been “increasing cases of arbitrary seizure of Nigerian children on very flimsy and unacceptable reasons. The decision to seize a suckling of two weeks and four days old from its mother and deprive the baby of the essential nutrients of breast milk and motherly love from its biological mother is indeed inhuman and an infringement of the mother’s basic human right and the child’s right to a family life.”
Also, the family of Queen Agho has brought the issue to the House of Representatives, where the Member representing Orhionmwon/Uhunmwode Federal Constituency, Samson Osagie, in a letter dated December 4, 2013, wrote to the Norwegian Embassy in Nigeria over the matter. The Norwegian Ambassador replied that he has forwarded the letter to the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for further action. The House on December 12, 2013, directed its Committee on Diaspora Affairs to look into the matter and ensure that justice is done.
One Kelvin Izekor, an uncle to Queen Agho, told journalists that an official of the Norwegian Child Welfare Authority failed to attend a meeting with the Chairperson, House Committee on Diaspora Affairs, Mrs. Abike Dabiri-Eruwa.
Izekor said, “On March 31 this year, I was called to the House [of Representatives] that an official of from the Norway Child Welfare Authority is coming to explain what happened. But later the clerk of the House called me to explain that the official was no longer coming.”
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