Uganda: Adoptive Parents Urge Gov’t to Reform National ID, Passport System for Parentless Children
Published: 23/Jun/2025
Source: Chimpreports.com
By Christopher Kiiza
Adoptive parents in Uganda are calling on the government to urgently reform the country’s national identification system, which they say discriminates against children without known biological parents.
Through the Adoptive Parents Initiative (API)—a platform that brings together parents who have adopted children—the parents argue that the current national ID and passport application forms are structured around assumptions of biological parentage, making it nearly impossible for parentless children, especially those coming out of childcare homes and orphanages, to access official identification documents and participate fully in society.
API chairman Andrew Rugasira said that children who grow up in childcare homes or those abandoned on the streets struggle to acquire a national identification due to an inability to prove their background.
“One of the things we have been trying to do in our advocacy is, if you look at the national ID forms, you find that the form itself assumes that the person applying for an ID has biological parents, and in many instances, if a child has not been adopted and has gone through a care home, and at 18 years comes onto the street, it’s very difficult for that child to apply for a national ID, even for a passport. Those forms need to change so that they can accommodate children who don’t have biological parents or biological lineage,” he said.
When filling out a national ID or passport form, one of the mandatory sections requires the applicant to provide information about their parents, including their names, national identification numbers, telephone numbers, places of birth, and dates of birth, among other details.
For children who were abandoned by parents or grew up in care homes and orphanages, it is extremely difficult to apply for a national ID or a passport because of their inability to trace and prove the roots of their parents.
Read further: https://chimpreports.com/adoptive-parents-urge-govt-to-reform-national-id-passport-system-for-parentless-children/