Where’s the mother of “Baby Niño”?
She may be the same woman who turned over the newborn boy to barangay Sto. Niño officials in Cebu City, said social workers.
There’s more than meets the eye in the initial account of a certain Arlene Ortega who said the baby was left to her care by a nameless young woman she just met on a Ceres bus in north Cebu last Tuesday.
Suchiella Arong, head of the Reception and Study Center for Children Department of Social Welfare and Development in Central Visayas (DSWD-7), said they are looking closer into discrepancies in the story, and whether “Arlene Ortega” was a false name to cover her tracks.
Social worker Lydia Dualos in Daanbantayan town alerted counterparts in Cebu City and compared notes after media reported about the baby abandoned on a bus in Bogo.
Dualos said the woman who introduced herself as Arlene Ortega fit the description of a mother who gave birth in the Daanbantayan District Hospital and was discharged on Monday, Nov. 14.
Two days earlier, the pregnant woman was on a bus to north Cebu looking for her live-in partner, but was unable to find the father of her child.
She went into labor and was brought to the Daanbantayan District Hospital where she stayed for two days.
Hospital records show the mother, a 38-year-old native of Bantayan Island, delivered a boy named “Christian.”
The baby weighed 3.6 kilograms and had a height of 50 centimeters at birth.
Cebu Daily News is withholding the mother’s name while the DSWD 7 is checking the reports.
Arong, head of the children’s center in Cebu City, said Dualos called the office yesterday morning about the startling discovery of coincidences.
Both women had similar physical features and described themselves as 38 years old and having work as a laundry woman.
The woman who identified herself as Ortega turned over the baby to Sto. Niño barangay captain Pancho Ramirez in Cebu City on Tuesday with the story that a young woman turned the infant over to her during a stopover in Bogo City to go to the toilet, but never came back.
Dr. Mario Fernandez, the Daanbantyan district hospital chief, called TV station CCTN-47 yesterday and said he alerted his staff after reading about the baby’s condition in Cebu Daily News.
He said the mother who gave birth to Christian was very poor and told them she was looking for her live-in partner, the father of the baby, who was working in a construction firm in Mandaue City.
Out of pity, they didn’t let her pay a centavo when she delivered in the hospital. They also administered vaccines for the baby and screened the newborn free of charge.
The mother first visited the Daanbantayan Social Welfare Office before she left for Mandaue City.
“She was very shaky when interviewed by the social worker in Daanbayantayan. She turned pale when she was asked about the baby,” said Neds Noel, social worker, who talked to Dualo about the encounter.
The woman first went to the Patria de Cebu, the main administration office of the Cebu archdiocese, to turn over the baby but found the office closed at past 6 p.m.
Arong said the woman was directed instead to go to the Sto. Niño barangay hall.
There she met Carmela Sanchez, the barangay’s Gender and Development (GAD) officer and identified herself as Arlene Ortega.
The woman claimed she already had five children and couldn’t afford to care for another child since her partner had no steady job.
After an overnight stay and medical checkup at the hospital, the baby was turned over to the DSWD-7.
The barangay captain gave him the temporary name “Niño Ramirez” after his own name.
DSWD-7 information officer Jaybee Binghay said they are coordinating with other agencies to search for the mother.
In case the mother can’t afford to raise the child on her own, Binghay said the agency will study legal options to put up the child for adoption. With STC Intern Tweeny Malinao