(Report) by Dhari Al-Duwiesh
KUWAIT, March 27 (KUNA) -- The establishment of Kuwait's first orphanage back in 1938, during the reign of Sheikh Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, stands as a testament to the state's keenness on caring for orphans and disenfranchised minors.
The main objective behind the establishment of an orphanage is to safeguard and manage the orphan's finances through investments or even defense in front of courts, that is until the orphan is of legal age and is able to act on their own behalf.
The orphanage's name underwent several changes to adapt to its nature. It became the orphanage affairs department indicating a more organized and systemized way of managing affairs, and later became the minors affairs department as linguistically the word orphanage does not encompass all minors whose finances need protecting.
In 1983, late Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, issued a law changing the department into a public authority presided over by the Minister of Justice.
The authority's General Director, Hamad Al-Barjes, commented that the authority has underwent significant transformations during the past few years.
He further clarified saying that recently decisions aiming to remove obstacles and enabling the authority from performing its duties effectively and efficiently were taken.
Al-Barjes stated that a strategy is currently in the works to help improve performance in correspondence to Kuwait's 2035 vision adding that they are aiming to accelerate pace of procedures especially as number of beneficiaries, which reached 49,000 beneficiary by the end of 2022, continues to increase.
He also affirmed their keenness on continuing to update investment strategy to ensure that minors' finances grow by an average of 10 percent, avoiding risks, and employing the use of instruments corresponding to Islamic law. (end) dd.aai