Four children adopted by NZ families return to Samoa after suffering abuse

By Lagi Keresoma/

Apia, SAMOA – 15 July 2026 – Four children adopted to New Zealand families have been returned to Samoa after confirmation of being abused at the hands of their adopted families.

The Chief Executive Officer of the Ministry of Justice & Courts Administration, Papali’i John Tamailelagi confirmed that the children aged from 12, 16, 18 and 20 were returned to Samoa last year and needed to undergo a lot of counselling and mentoring because of the impact of what happened to them.

He said what was done to the 12-year-old was terrible and the reports provided for these children were not good.

“They need care and that is where the Ministry of Health, Ministry of Education and other appropriate sectors come in to ensure these children are well taken care of,” said Papali’i.

He said that the problem is with some of the adopted parents and the challenges became an issue for New Zealand.

The Samoan adoption process is that after the court grants the adoption, the child becomes a New Zealand citizen and the biological parents’ rights to the child revoked.

“New Zealand is concerned that some adopted children from Samoa have been abused and some treated as slaves and these issues prompted the New Zealand Government to suspend adoptions temporarily in September 2025,” said Papali’i.

He also confirmed that there are Samoan children currently under the care of the New Zealand Tamariki Family & Whanau Care.

Out of Australia and the United States where Samoan children are also adopted, New Zealand has the highest number of mistreated children.

A look beyond the adoption seal
Papali’i said, in Samoa, the Ministry of Justice receives at least 10 adoption applications a week.

He said the Court takes into consideration the child’s welfare and that the law does not look at the adopted parents or the biological parents, but for the best interests of the child.

He said the process is once the adoption is granted, then that closes the case, however, they never looked beyond the granting of the adoption.

“We need to work on a process that abuse and other issues will not happen again, and we need to check the adopted parents background if they have any criminal records,” he said.

He said rather than closing a case after the adoption application is granted, they need to look further and check what comes after.

There are families who have submitted very nice home and bedroom for the adopted child, but some of these photos are from the internet.

“When we google the address, the photo that appears is very different from the one submitted in the applications,” he said.

Discharging of adoption order
Papali’i confirmed that there are children who were adopted who now want to return home and to their biological parents. So these children will have to go through another process which is the application to discharge the adoption order.

“For that to happen, we need to inform and prepare the biological parents and make the necessary arrangements and that’s where the Ministry of Family Affairs comes in,” he said.

Returning an adopted child to Samoa does not revoke the childs’ New Zealand citizenship but only the rights of the adopted parents.

He said the child retains his/her dual citizen and we cannot deny the child to return despite being a New Zealand citizen. He also said the child has to be accompanied by someone from the Ministry of Justice or others to Samoa.

The cut –off age to adopt a child in Samoa is 21 but Papali’i said the New Zealand Government have a Bill before Parliament to reduce that age to 18 years old.