DSWD waits for Baby Niño’s mother

WITH his thick black hair, rosy cheeks and chinky eyes, it’s hard to believe a mother would abandon a baby this appealing.

“Baby Niño” was given a medical checkup and turned over yesterday to social workers after the week-old infant was left by his teenage mother, still unidentified, to a stranger she shared a bus ride with in Bogo City last Tuesday.

“Whoever the mother is, we appeal to her to come back for her child. We can help her with her needs,” said Neds Noel of the Department of Social Welfare and Development in Central Visayas (DSWD-7).

After three months, if no one comes forward to claim the baby, abandonment proceedings will begin and the child will be put up for adoption.

The infant was turned over by Sto. Niño barangay captain Pancho Ramirez who gave the baby the temporary name “Niño Ramirez,” after his own.

The baby’s facial features lead social workers to wonder if his father is a Japanese or Korean.

The infant was brought to Sto. Niño barangay hall last Wednesday by Arlene Ortega, a 38-year-old mother of five, who was on a Ceres bus bound for Cebu City when she met the baby and his young mother, who was her seatmate.

In a stopover in Bogo City, the mother who looked 17 or 18 years old, asked Ortega to hold the baby while she went down to use the toilet. She never returned.

Baby Niño was put in a crib shared with three other babies in DSWD.

“He never cries. He doesn’t make any fuss except when he’s hungry,” said Noel, the social worker who fed him bottled milk.

Niño was wrapped in a white cloth and faded blue sleeveless shirt when he was found with his umbilical cord still intact, which places his age at four to five days old.

The DSWD-7 Reception and Study Center for Children has 26 babies up for adoption. Baby Niño may be the 27th.

“We don’t get many adoptions here. If we’re lucky, we’d have 10 adoptions annually,” Noel said.

The DSWD is keeping in touch with Ortega, who owns a store in the Bogo City bus terminal in case the mother contacts her.

Noel said the DSWD can help the young mother financially and provide counseling. She may visit the DSWD office or call the office at 032-233-8779.

Noel said she believes the mother is struggling with personal problems that forced her to abandon the baby. With STC intern Tweeny Malinao