Parents of surrogate born daughter battle to bring her home - Video
Little Sophia Anne is back home and well. Thank you to all those that supported us, you will always be in our thoughts.
After much stress and strain over the last 4 weeks Sophia is allowed to come home. Thank you to all those who commented, gave moral and practical help. We will be forever in your debt.
These buggers left it to the very last moment this Friday to make a decision which meant I had to rush across Auckland and Komla across Bangkok to put the finishing touches to it.
It was cruel, vile, petty, political, public and had Monty pythonesque moments when I thought we would continue with the same monotonous, dangerous, bureaucratic treadmill forever.
We pay these people to work for us but they work against us instead.
Not even a whisper of the word sorry was uttered.
Our country is truly in a mess when its citizens can be punished in this way.
I have really lost faith in our leaders over this and the other nonsense they are up to.
My wife and I are proud parents of a 2 and a half week old girl Sophia. Our first child. She was born using a surrogate.
The only problem is that my wife and child may be stuck in Bangkok because of bureaucracy at New Zealand Immigration and a couple of other government agencies.
What is supposed to be a time of joy has been turned into one of despair, loneliness anxiety and doubt as we have had to cope with dealing with New Zealand Immigration.
Instead of bonding with our girl we have been arguing with the state.
Sophia has a Thai passport and got it in less than 3 days. She is allowed to leave that country but NZ immigration will not give her a Visa to enter New Zealand.
I have done my best considering all the ambiguous, wrong information we have been given and have gone as far as the Immigration Minister, Jonathon Coleman but they have refused her entry.
We have done everything by the book but to no avail, we are stuck in a bureaucratic black hole where no law applies to our case and the minister will not rectify things by either using commonsense and setting a precedent for such cases by letting her in, or changing the law under urgency.
Our last port of call was the media, so if you want to see the detail of our case have a look at the Campbell Live video above, originally screened at 7.00pm Friday 28 to see my interview.
I would be grateful for any support with comments below, it just might help us.
There is something even more practical you can do to help us though. Email or phone your MP and ask them nicely to see sense. Tell your friends as well. You can find your local MP and their contact details here
All our love back at you all,
Darren & Komla
