i think it's so weird that the father would suddenly realize what adoption meant...was it not properly explained to him when he dropped the boy off at the orphanage?
even if he goes to england to live, i'm sure the boy will show interest in his biological father and want to visit one day.
this whole situation is one big emotional mess (for all sides, i'm sure) and i'm glad i don't have to try and clean up. i hope those PR people are getting paid a time and a half.

this is getting crazy!!!

Don't know if I am correct about this: in America the biological mother has a right to the child. After giving birth, the mother sometimes changes her mind and the people who were expecting to be adoptive parents have to pay for the hospital and doctor's fees even if the baby stays with the mother.

I am hoping that Madonna will have the opportunity to make this adoption official. It's a wonderful gesture that she's making to Malawi.

International child trafficking doesn't do much for her image. Maybe the next celebrity to adopt will pick a child who really is an orphan!

In this case, the father put him in the orphanage for care and feeding because the mother died a month after childbirth and the father couldn't care for a new infant. Kind of like social services, which is what he now says he thought Madonna was offering. He didn't want to cut his ties to his son and give him away permanently. The Dad is illiterate, so it was all explained to him by the Malawi government verbally, then they had him sign papers he couldn't read.

Whether or not what was translated to Madonna and what was told to the father are the same thing is the legal question.

the word adoption was used when he spoke to the press in interviews as well..am I completely jaded in thinking the father might have thought his son could be raised by Madonna and then share his "wealth" with him when he was older?

Who in their right mind would let their son enjoy a rich, privlegded lifestyle temporarily and then make him come back to a mud shack without electricity and no hope for a future.. thats more cruel then growing up in an orphange.

And I am shocked that she is not wearing a sweat suit.. not loving the jacket,,, but the shoes are cute.

this whole thing is fishy. i wonder what was told to madonna and what was told to the boy's father?

so the idea is that the dad was using the orphange as a sort of child pawn shop? bullsh*t. i smell extortion.

The father doesn't speak English, so he probably doesn't know the word adoption from hamburger. Perhaps the father had hopes (like many parents) that with a good Western education his son could return to Malawi and make a difference, maybe in politics, engineering, or some other way. That's pretty common for people with means in African countries to want to return to help their country after getting a good education elsewhere.

I was just reading an article that said: In the Reuters interview, Banda said what he was told by the officials was that the papers he signed said Madonna would look after David, educate him and bring him back.

"What he has told you now is not true," Kilembe said, but refusing to provide the adoption papers that the father signed.

Also consider that Malawi laws forbid international adoption by non-residents, so there is no context for the father to have understood that he was giving away his son forever, to new parents.

The reason he wasn't living with the father was financial. If Madonna had just donated the cost of her legal fees and the kids private plane ride to the family, they probably could have afforded to raise him and she could have picked a real orphan, with no living parents.

crazy. it will be hard to watch his son grow up in the tabloids to Im sure

But the father was also giving interviews to journalist who spoke his language and telling them that he understood this adoption and was excited that his son was going to have a better life.. now she will probably have to give the child back and he will live the rest of his childhood at this orphanage.. sad. And I don't think she should pay the father to raise the child or give any more money to the orphange then what was already planned or it seems like it could be a form of extortion. And soon this start happening to all wealthy couples who try to adopt.

when is she gonna have time to take care of another kid?

I don't view it as extortion. She doesn't have to give the family any money, I'm just pointing out that for far less than she has already spent on this child, he could have been raised to adulthood by his own family in his own culture. But it looks like she was more interested in her vanity than what might be best for the child. Ripping him reminds me of when the relatives of Elian Gonzalez tried to keep him in Florida, rather than be raised by his own father in his own country.

It's similar to when social services takes away a child from a single parent who can't afford child care but has to work to support the child. Social services spends a chunk of tax payers money to have a foster parent raise the child, and if only there was a way to give the parent that money for child care, they could afford to work and raise their own kid, which is what most parents would want.

This is just a huge mess. Hopefully she can clear things up on Oprah!

If and when the child is finished with his education, he can return to Malawi if he so desires, no? Adopting him doesn't equal owning him. He'll be an adult one day and he can go where he pleases.

Ginger - I've never heard of social services taking custody of children whose parents can't afford child care.

This whole situation is a mess. I don't know who or what to believe and I don't know who actually has this child's best interests as their priority.

I would like to pop out a child, give him to someone else to shoulder the expense and burden of feeding, raising, and caring for my child, and then get him/her back at 18, all ready to be an adult and do me proud living with me in my hut. This father is now become selfish selfish selfish, and this most likely coincides with the realization that Madonna earns more than the entire country's GDP. Besides, when the child is grown, he will be able to decide to go back to Malawi (or not to). She should give the baby back and pick out another one with less baggage.

This has nothing to do with Madonna but, I just saw this, and thought I would share.... Karl Lagerfeld in UGGs!! What is the world coming to? Link below
http://celebrity.aol.com/people/ataol/galleries/0,26617,1546113_5,00.htm...

Sorry, Pop I forgot were not supposed to post links in here. Sorry, everyone.

This whole situation is a mess.

Madonna tries way to hard to get attention, its something crazy with her all the time and it seems shes doing it to upstage angelina, which is a very sad way to get attention

cough..........won't be watchin'..

If she has done nothing wrong why protest your innocence????

Ye protest too much

this whole situation is a big oll mess!! My gosh all she wanted to do was adopt and now it has become this whole big phenomenon!

I just agree that maybe she should have chosen to adopt a child with no parents. I'm not sure the father is selfish. I think he's uneducated and if the government was willing to break it's own adoption rules, I don't think they would be above lying to this man about the adoption.

Nice shoes.
_____________________________

"Amor vincit omnia"

She looks like such crap lately.

yeah i agree

The father is illiterate. He is is uneducated. He probably saw all the hype around this ,and went with it, and someone cued him in that Madge is one of the richest women in the world, and he wants a peice. It is not that crazy. What is crazy is that she would pick a child with strings attached. She really should of beenb a little smarter and chose a child with no strings. I wonder what it was about this boy that she chose him over all of the kids.