The going won't be as smooth for Madonna as it was Angelina Jolie. The 48-year-old pop star's adoption of a Malawian toddler has come under fire from certain parties, with human rights groups in the African republic seeking an injunction against Madonna's move. The singer has already been granted an interim permission to take the custody of the one-year-old boy, David Banda.
The rights groups contend that the law has been tweaked to allow for the adoption only because of Madonna's celebrity status. Under Malawian adoption laws, non-resident foreigners cannot adopt local children and take them outside the country.
“What has happened is a shortcut. They (the government) haven't followed the law,” said Boniface Mandere, a spokesman for the child rights group Eye of the Child, which is one of the several seeking the injunction. Even though the pop star was granted the interim custody of the toddler, she and her husband Guy Ritchie left the country without David as his passport and immigration papers are being drawn up.
“We submitted an appeal to the Ministry of Women and Child Development to delay the implementation of the interim order. We want to give them time to pass an act making inter-country adoption legal and setting out the framework and rights for the adopted children. At the moment children have no rights under Malawi law. Today it is a celebrity adopting a child. Tomorrow it may be a trafficker seeking to adopt,” said Eye of the Child's executive director Maxwell Madewere.
Under the Malawian Bill of Rights, child rights groups have a say in child-related decisions of the government. So the opposition could seriously hamper Madonna's adoption of the boy, who lost his mother due to complications arising out of childbirth.
According to Mandere, the group is not protesting the adoption but the way in which it was carried out. “What Eye of the Child is saying is: You cannot buy a child as if you are buying a house. This process is too short, applying on Tuesday, and yesterday the court gave the okay. I don't think that the high court has any information about how Madonna is when it comes to child-rearing,” he said of the singer who is mother to two children – 10-year-old Lourdes and six-year-old Rocco.
Another African group African Network for Prevention and Protection against Child Abuse and Neglect said that it was also mulling injunction against the adoption. Spokesperson Deogratias Yiga said: “A child belongs to a family, a child belongs to a community, and these relations are very important in terms of your identity when you grow up. Picking children, one or two children, and taking them to live in Europe is help alright, but is a very, very limited contribution to the problems of children on the continent.”
Meanwhile, breaking her silence, Madonna, through her publicist confirmed the adoption. “Madonna and her husband have been granted custody. Final legal arrangements are being made to bring him back home,” the publicist said.
