Posted on 10/17/2006 9:49:04 AM PDT by COUNTrecount
Madonna has revealed she's "never been happier" after an emotional trip to Malawi to adopt a 13-month-old baby.
After being allowed to take little David Banda home, the superstar added: 'It's so worth it. He's just the best baby ever. Guy and I have never been happier.'
Madonna set for further adoption hurdles in Britain
Madonna, 48, wants David to be a brother to her children, Lourdes, nine, and Rocco, five.
And she has already got her eyes on a three-year-old girl from the same village as David. Describing the moment she saw her, she said: "I looked at this child with questioning dark eyes and the saddest smile. I thought, 'She looks just like me.' I told Guy, 'We must give this child a home, too.'"
Madonna has spoken about the possibility of adoption before. But intriguingly, Hello! magazine claims today that she had to overcome marital problems with Guy before going ahead with her Malawi plans.
"She wanted to wait until a rough patch in her marriage was smoothed over before she brought any more children into the situation," a relative of Madonna's in Michigan told Taraborrelli.
Thirteen-month-old David Banda flew in to Heathrow first class from Johannesburg on Sunday. No sooner had he touched down than he had his first taste of what life will be like with one of the world's biggest stars.
The team bringing him in - a nanny, bodyguard and other aides - dodged reporters at Terminal 1 arrivals hall before driving off in a silver Mercedes people carrier.
But they could not avoid all the photographers and camera crews, and today these pictures - of an innocent clinging for solace to his nanny, utterly ignorant of the fuss surrounding him - will flash around the world as the controversy over the adoption rages.
For the legal arguments are far from over. So far Madonna and her husband Guy Ritchie have been granted an interim adoption order and David has been issued with a passport and visa.
But they have only been given temporary custody for 18 months, and after that anything can happen.
For now David needs a home, and as of this morning that is Madonna's house in London. Just before 8am the people carrier with blacked-out windows raced into the rear garage of the property near Marble Arch.
Photographers swarmed around the vehicle as a rear gate was opened.
The child was put on a private jet from Malawi to South Africa yesterday afternoon after the courts issued the travel documents.
A passenger who sat next to the baby and his minders in first class said: "The baby was happy and laughing and was just so sweet. He looks very healthy and is absolutely adorable.
The first thing I noticed about him was just how cute he was. I think they will make a great family." The American woman in her thirties said the baby, who was dressed in blue denim shorts, a white shirt and trainers, was put in an adult-sized grey hooded jacket before being taken off the plane.
Now safely ensconced inside Fortress Madonna, David's material needs will be more than satisfied.
But his would-be adoptive mother has her own needs too, and today the Madonna publicity machine began the task of overcoming the doubts of a sometimes sceptical world.
A seven-page spread in Hello! offers pictures of what the magazine describes as Madonna's "emotional trip to Malawi" - and poignant talk of the bond that has already been forged between adoptive mother and child.
According to the writer J Randy Taraborrelli - Madonna's biographer - when she phoned her parents in Michigan to give them the news that she was being allowed to take David home she said: "It's so worth it. He's just the best little baby ever. Guy and I have never been happier."
Madonna left Malawi on Friday following a week-long visit to orphanages there - the same day that human rights groups filed court documents asking a judge to review the adoption amid claims it had been fast-tracked.
Human rights groups claim the authorities may be bending the rules in return for the singer pledging $3million (£1.6million) to help children in Malawi.
Boniface Mandere, of Eye Of The Child, a local child protection society involved in the challenge, said: "The court seems to have made a decision based on Madonna's wealth.
"But being a good parent is not about money.
It is about caring, having heart, it's about love."
Malawi law requires would-be parents to live in the country for a year while social welfare officers investigate their ability to care for the child. Foreigners are not allowed to adopt children - but these rules appear to have been waived in Madonna's case.
Justin Dzonzi, a lawyer for the human rights groups challenging the adoption, said they were not against Madonna adopting a child.
"But we are concerned that the correct procedures be followed and that our laws to protect children are not undermined - and our law is very clear that there is no inter-country adoption," he said. Mr Dzonzi stressed that the adoption was not yet final.
The star's spokeswoman, Liz Rosenberg, said: "The interim adoption grants David's new parents temporary custody for 18 months, during which time they will be evaluated by the courts of Malawi per the tribal customs of the country."
Half a million children in the country have been orphaned by Aids. Yet David is not an orphan - his father gave him up because he was unable to care for him after David's mother died a week after his birth. Peasant farmer Yohane Banda took the baby to an orphanage to be cared for when he became sick at five weeks old. He had already lost his first two children to malaria. Mr Banda is said to be happy about the adoption.
The child's picture is believed to be among 12 emailed to Madonna from the Home of Hope Orphan Care Centre in Mchinji. The orphanage director, the Rev Thompson Chipeta, told Mr Banda "a very nice Christian lady" wanted to offer David a home.
It was two months ago that Madonna announced she was to donate money to the country through the Raising Malawi charity. Her partner in the project is Michael Berg, founder of the Kabbalah Centre in Los Angeles.
According to Hello! Madonna and Ritchie had already been in and out of the country twice unbeknown to the world's press, and had already started the process of adoption before making this last trip to the country. At one point the flood of media inquiries became so intensive that Madonna raged: "I can't do anything privately."
An incredulous Guy replied: "You must be joking! Please don't tell me you only just figured that out."
For one who has courted controversy all her professional life, Madonna has proved remarkably sensitive to criticism over the adoption. "I know for a fact that Madonna was hurt by the comments," said Matthew Hamilton, a Los Angeles-based friend of Ritchie's. "But Guy told her that they would just have to let go of all the criticism and controversy. 'Really, how dare anyone question her motives?' Guy said. 'Hasn't she proved anything?' It's so preposterous that anyone would be critical of Madonna for wanting to share her love and wealth."
I want a little "Ethernopian" too!
Who'll be next adopting an African baby? Jack Nicholson? Ted Danson?
I am sure the baby will be brought up using the best nannies available in England.
Vile woman.
bill and hillary maybe
Why do I get the feeling that this baby will form a greater bond with the nanny than with publicity (and all-purpose) ho and phony baloney cult member Madonna?
"He's just the best baby ever"
HA-HA!!! Rocco and Lourdes, you both suck.
Owl_Eagle
If what I just wrote made you sad or angry,
it was probably just a joke.
How sad that this little boy was taken from his father. Surely there were children with no living relatives.
I can't decide which one is weirder, Madonna or Angelina Jolie.
Madonna is a floating aquatic algal mat.
Of course Madonna and her ilk probably felt the same way about Elian being taken from his "father."
She really is Miss Sensitivity, isn't she? You had to hope that Carlos Leon and Guy Ritchie give some sense normalcy and reality to those kids, because Mom is a self-absorbed, Class A fruitcake.
Vile woman - because she is adopting children? or just in general? Same opinion about Josephine Baker?
I don't see a connection, sorry. Are you implying that Madonna is the boy's mother?
so, who was the broker and what was his cut?
If I had my way, she'd be arrested at Heathrow for human trafficking.
I doubt Jack Nicholson I could be wrong beside he has plenty of kids those two kids with that live in girlfriend in 1990s and daughter from previous marraige in 1960s
So I doubt Jack adopt African baby
Ted Danson I am not sure Mary Stenbergen has daughter from her previous marriage with Clockwork Orange Malcom McDowell
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