Madonna will be allowed to adopt four-year-old Chifundo (in English the name means “Mercy”) James after all, Malawian judges have decided.
The three judges of Malawi’s highest court, in a June 12 session, overruled a lower court’s denial of Madonna’s adoption petition. Malawian law says that an adopting parent must have been a resident of Malawi for eighteen months. This requirement was waived when Madonna adopted her son David. She was allowed to take David home in 2006, and a Malawian court gave her and her then-husband Guy Ritchie permanent custody in May 2008 following an evaluation by social welfare officials.
Some human rights groups in Africa had filed petitions opposing Madonna adopting again. These groups said they feared that Madonna’s fame and charitable works were allowing her to be exempted from the law, and that that precedent would put other children at risk for exploitation or black-market adoption.
In April Judge Esme Chondo agreed with these groups, saying that although she was tempted to allow the adoption because of the opportunities life with Madonna would afford to Mercy, she had to deny it because she believed waiving the residency requirement might be a step towards child trafficking.
Adding complications was the opposition of a man who claimed to be the child’s birth father, although he had never seen the child previously. The government said it recognized the girl’s maternal relatives as her guardians, and they were in favor of the adoption.
The high court judges said that they did in fact take Madonna’s charitable works into account, saying she has shown a serious commitment to Malawi. The judges also noted that she has established a residence at one of the several schools and orphanages which she funds. The judges believed it wasn’t necessary for Madonna to reside there full-time for eighteen months, saying that law was made in an earlier time and now many people have more than one residence.
Alan Chinula, Madonna’s lawyer, says that the court’s decision made the adoption final. Some others involved in the case are saying it isn’t certain whether that decision was a final adoption, or whether it granted permission for final adoption. Either way, Chinula says he is now working on getting the child a passport so that she can go home with Madonna.
(In international adoption cases, although they have been to the U.S. embassy and received a visa to enter the U.S., the children are not yet U.S. citizens at the time they leave their country. Therefore, they must have a passport or travel papers from their country of origin. Some countries issue a special temporary document for this purpose. In countries where the adoption is completed overseas, the child becomes a citizen upon entry into the U.S. Adoptions from Korea and India are finalized in U.S. courts and the child becomes a citizen on the day of the adoption finalization.)
For a story of our former blogger’s experience with the process of getting her child’s passport, see this blog: Much Ado about a Passport.
We have covered the story of Madonna’s seeking to adopt Mercy James both here in the Adoption blog and in the Popular Culture blog. You can read the story in these blogs:
Adoption in the News this Week—from ER to Madonna to the Hague
Court is Adjourned–for Now–in Madonna’s Adoption Appeal