Hajia Ramat Seriki, the Chairman of llorin East Local Government Council of Kwara, has expressed readiness to adopt a baby abandoned at the entrance of the council secretariat in Okeoyi.
The baby, a female, was abandoned by a yet to be identified person.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that some residents of Okeoyi and staff of the council discovered the new born baby girl smartly put on a piece of cloth at the entrance of the secretariat.
NAN also reports that when the chairman of the council was informed of the incident, she arrived at the secretariat, took the abandoned baby to the Motherless Babies Home, under the state Ministry of Social Welfare.
Seriki, in an interview with NAN in llorin on Saturday, described the action of the unidentified mother of the abandoned baby as callous, barbaric and unacceptable.
She said all effort to identify the mother of the baby proved abortive, stating that the baby has been delivered to the Motherless babies home at NNPC Pipeline Road in llorin.
The Chairman expressed her readiness to adopt the baby if the yet to be identified biological mother refuses to claim the baby.
“I am fully ready to adopt the baby by signing all necessary documents if nobody claims her within the next three months,’’ she said.
Seriki said that she would be providing all necessary items for the upbringing of the baby while at the Motherless babies home, pending when she would formally adopt her.
When contacted on the issue, Hajia Hafsat lbrahim, the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Social Welfare, confirmed that the abandoned baby was now at the Motherless home under the ministry.
She said any arrangement on her adoption by anybody would follow due process at the ministry.
