Madonna ‘kind of adopting entire country’

Madonna’s project, called Raising Malawi, aims to set up an orphan care center to provide food, education and shelter for up to 4,000 children. It will have projects based on Kabbalah, Jewish mysticism that has gained popularity in recent years and which counts the 48-year-old singer among its devotees.

Kabbalah is virtually unheard of in Malawi, a predominantly Roman Catholic country where superstitions and belief in witchcraft run high.

Philippe van den Bossche, project coordinator for Raising Malawi, said he welcomed Madonna’s visit to the southern African nation.

“Any organization would be happy to know that they are being supported by such a beacon of hope. We are very grateful for the work she is doing in the country and for the project,” he said. “She is an extraordinary inspiration and will hopefully inspire people to put children first.”

Van Den Bossche said the orphan care center would be completed next March, a year after work on it began.

Madonna is due to meet government officials in the capital, Lilongwe, on Friday and visit more orphanages.

In a letter on the organization’s Web site, Madonna said she hoped to help “bring an end to the extreme poverty and degradation suffered by Malawi’s orphans.”

Madonna joins a growing list of entertainer-activists who have focused on Africa.

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, whose daughter was born in Namibia earlier this year, recently announced they would donate $1 million each to two humanitarian organizations active on the continent. They also have two adopted children — one from Ethiopia and one from Cambodia.

Mchiela told the AP on Wednesday that if they adopt, Madonna and her husband would be subject to a probation period required of all prospective adoptive parents.

She said that after the couple “fill in the papers, we’ll allow them to take him away, not as adoptive parents but foster parents until after the 18 to 24 months, when the government of Malawi will assess whether they are a suitable family. This is a legal requirement that cannot be fast-tracked.”

Madonna and Ritchie have a son, Rocco, 5, and the singer also has a daughter, Lourdes, 9.

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