Hälsning från Heidi i Sydafrika

How i would just love to greet you personally as Sverige is such an awesome country to visit and to see all you beautiful people again , I also hear that you are having a super summer! Anyways I send you greetings from Pretoria instead and greetings from all my fellow workers here at Abba. 

This is just a short message to let you all know how things are going here at Abba at the moment. I am sure that all of you are aware of the fact that that new Child Care Act was implemented the 1st April 2010. It was difficult to determine beforehand how it will affect our Intercountry program. We take it day by day and thus far it has not had a major impact on the way we work and on our Inter country planning. We have adapted to the time frames and have started building relationships with new courts that we are now also working with. There are in other words now more courts that you  might go to such as Alberton Court, Kimberly Court and other Courts country wide so we might travel more. We have learned to adapt and be flexible in this regard and will prepare you before the time.  

Then you have heard about RACAP and that all the children that are available for adoption in South Africa will first be on a National Register for a period of 60 days in order to find South African families. After the circulation the children are then released to be matched for Intercountry adoptions if there were no suitable SA families ready to adopt.  We have had a interim process where some children that were already matched before and fell under the previous law could proceed as normal, the time has now arrived where all the children will be put on RACAP. Again we are not sure how it will affect us in the future,  we have started to experience the adaption as there are no families coming in the first 3 weeks of August, but we do foresee being back on track from September.  

Our hope and belief is that more children will benefit and also that we will be able to continue with our Intercountry program as is.  I hope this gives you more insight into how the new law and RACAP are influencing things and that you can look forward to your adoption in SA. Pray with us that we will be able to continue as we have.  

As I always say, we have such a wonderful relationship with Adoption Centrum and we honor them for linking the best families to Abba! Thanks for being so GREAT!  

Now go do the Waka Waka dance and enjoy the weekend! I hope you all have a great day and summer time!

Loads and loads of SA hugs to you all from Heidi