Franzisla Krug/Action Press/ Zuma, BARM/Fame Pictures Papa don't preach. In fact, Papa's barely old enough to drive.
The father of Mercy James, the 3-year-old Malawi infant Madonna has been unsuccessfully trying to adopt, has suddenly surfaced and says he wants a role in the life of the daughter he thought he lost.
The only problem is that James Kambewa is just 15, and Mercy's relatives are already questioning his fitness to raise her.
In an interview with People, Kambewa, now a security guard, says he was the boyfriend of the girl's mother, 15-year-old Mwandida Maunde, and ended up fathering Mercy. He said he ran away before the baby was born. Upon learning that Maunde died a few days after going into labor on Jan. 22, 2006, he assumed the child had died as well—only to learn that Mercy was alive thanks to all the publicity surrounding the Material Mom's bid to take formal custody of her.
"Now that I know [Mercy] is alive, I am willing to support her," the young man tells the magazine, noting that he and Maunde were high school students when he accidentally knocked her up. "Her parents were furious that I had messed up their daughter. They caused hell for me so I left town."
News that Mercy's dad has turned up unexpectedly hasn't gone over well with Maunde's surviving family members, who are reportedly up in arms.
"Where was he all this time?" asked Mercy's uncle Peter Baneti. "He wasn't there when his girlfriend was pregnant; he didn't even attend her funeral when she died eight days after giving birth to Mercy. We don't think he even knew she had a baby."
Mercy's family has said it was too poor to care for the girl and so they gave her to Madonna's Kondanani orphanage, which is where the entertainer first met the child. She eventually decided to adopt Mercy, as she had with another motherless Malawi child, 3-year-old David Banda.
Initially, Mercy's family resisted Madonna's overtures, saying they hoped to adopt her themselves when she came of age. They changed their minds, however, after talks with the Malawi government, which has been an avid supporter of the singer's adoption bid, and her charity, Raising Malawi.
Madonna's petition was rejected Friday by a local judge who ruled that the Queen of Pop did not maintain full-time residency in the African country for the required period. Madonna in turn appealed the decision to the country's supreme court.
She has since decamped for London, where she was greeted by ex-husband Guy Ritchie.