Alpha Mummy: Is foreign adoption the best option?

Madonna is expected in Malawi this weekend to try to adopt a second child from the impoverished southern African country, government sources have told The Times.

The pop singer, who divorced Guy Ritchie, the film director, recently, will take her Malawian son David with her to visit his natural father as part of the controversial deal that allowed his adoption to be fast tracked.

“We expect her over the weekend or even earlier than that . . . but without a doubt she is coming,” said an official at the Ministry of Child Development, which deals with foreign adoptions.

Sources also confirmed that Madonna may attend a procedural hearing at the High Court on a second adoption on Monday. However, child rights activists noted that as a single parent the singer could face a bigger legal battle second time round, as Malawian law strongly favours adoptions by married couples.

“She will have to prove that as a single parent she still has the abilities to raise another child alone,” said John Phiri, a local activist who strongly criticised the Government over the previous adoption for apparently bending the regulations.

Malawi does not approve adoptions for single or divorced people as a rule, but the official at the country’s welfare department said that each case was considered on merit.

In an interview with the daily Nation newspaper this month Madonna was quoted as saying that Malawian friends had advised her that David needed a brother or sister. She admitted wanting to adopt again but “only with the support of the Malawian people”.

Writing in response to e-mailed questions from readers last week, Madonna said: “It’s something I have been considering.” Critics had accused the Malawian Government of sidestepping laws banning foreign adoptions simply because Madonna, 50, was a wealthy celebrity.

The singer was accused of “buying” the child after she set up a charity called Raising Malawi, which is about to start building a multimillion-pound school for girls. Madonna took David Banda, then 13 months old, to Britain in 2006, but the adoption was declared official only last year. Normally, children have to stay in the country until the adoption is legalised. Supporters said that David, who had been left in an orphanage by his father, would receive an education and have a life of far greater opportunity. He now lives in a sumptuous flat in New York and already has a lifestyle unimaginable in his native village of Lipunga, where people eke out a living eating maize cooked on open fires, and a wealthy person is someone who earns £1 a day.

After David’s adoption was legalised, Madonna said that the difficulties had arisen because “this adoption essentially was the beginning of the creation of adoption laws in Malawi”. She said she hoped that it would make it easier for others to adopt from the country, adding: “I am the template or the role model, so to speak, for future adoptions.”

The star has two biological children – Rocco, her son with Guy Ritchie, and Lourdes, whose father is Carlos Leon. Madonna’s divorce was finalised in November. David’s father, Yohane Banda, a peasant farmer, said that he had been told he might see his son next week. “Someone from Raising Malawi visited me last week and told me that my son may be visiting me sometime next week. I am delighted. I want to see my son,” he was quoted as saying by Reuters.

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