Madonna denies reports that she’s trying to adopt two more children from Malawi
Madonna during a visit to Malawi in July.
Madonna says she isn’t trying to adopt two more children from Malawi, the southeast African nation that’s home to Raising Malawi, the charity she co-founded in 2006 to help impoverished orphans.
“I am in Malawi to check on the children’s hospital in Blantyre and my other work with Raising Malawi, and then heading home,” Madonna said in a statement obtained by the Associated Press. “The rumors of an adoption process are untrue.”
A government official told the Associated Press earlier Wednesday that the pop star -- who on Saturday was at the Women’s March on Washington to perform and talk about “blowing up the White House” -- had appeared in front of a High Court judge in Lilongwe, Malawi’s capitol, to make an adoption plea.
Also, the Nyasa Times newspaper in Malawi reported that attorney Titus Mvalo had confirmed that the singer was pursuing the adoption of two children, presumably the ones she and a personal assistant were seen carrying later in the day. The Nyasa Times said Mvalo was Madonna’s lawyer.
In 2006, Mvalo had been retained by a Malawi human-rights group to oppose Madonna when she was trying to adopt son David Banda, then 13 months old. He wound up quitting that case before it was adjudicated.
“I decided to withdraw because I thought that there was a high possibility of being misunderstood by society,” the attorney told reporters at the time, adding that he thought the adoption would be good for the boy.
Madonna was allowed to adopt David, now 11, after a requirement that adoptive parents live in the country for 18 months was waived. Her 2009 adoption of daughter Mercy James, now 11, from Malawi went through after the singer went to a higher court after her filing was initially rejected over the residency requirement. She won on appeal.
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