Only a court can decide whether Madonna can adopt a second child from Malawi, the government said today, after the star revealed she was thinking of finding a new sibling for her adopted son David.
Malawi’s Nation newspaper has quoted the superstar as saying that she was considering whether to adopt again from Malawi, but would only do so if she had support from the government and the public.
“Many people – especially our Malawian friends – say that David should have a Malawian brother or sister,” Madonna was quoted as saying in the paper earlier this week.
“It’s something I have been considering, but would only do if I had the support of the Malawian people and government,” she added in an e-mail to the paper.
However Cyrus Jeke, a spokesman for Ministry of Child and Women Development, said it was not simply of case of winning over public opinion.
“It’s not pre-conceived. A high court judge must be convinced about the adoption,” Jeke said.
Madonna’s adoption of toddler David Banda was finalised last year. His father Yohane had left the child at an orphanage to escape grinding poverty in his rural village in Mchinji, in central Malawi, which has no running water nor electricity. His natural mother died soon after childbirth.
The government here, burdened by 1.5 million children orphaned by AIDS, backed the adoption of David, which sparked a vortex of protest from local rights groups and heated debate about adoption laws in the country.
The Human Rights Consultative Committee, which spearheaded the legal challenge on the controversial adoption, maintained Madonna’s adoption could allow others to take advantage of Malawi’s lack of inter-country adoption laws.
Malawi is now reforming its laws to allow easier adoptions by foreigners.
Madonna has set up a charity in Malawi, Raising Malawi, which provides support for Malawi’s orphans and vulnerable children.
She has already built a multi-purpose community centre at Mphandula village, 50 kilometres from the capital Lilongwe, which looks after more than 8,000 orphans in scores of villages in the area.
But Consol Homes, which is in partnership with Raising Malawi, does not allow its children to be adopted but to be raised within families and communities.
“We encourage a community kind of approach to raising orphans because it helps strengthens families.” said Alfred Chapomba, one of the founders of Consol Homes.
AFP