IT seems many of us entertain childhood fantasies of adoption. A straw poll of pals reveals some suspected that if they didn’t behave properly they would have been “sent back” at any time, while others confess to having fervently hoped they were not biologically related to the people who purported to be their parents.

For me, the concept proved a useful tool for domination of my younger siblings: if they didn’t do what I desired, they were told I would withdraw the considerable privileges bestowed on me by my real (but dead) parents which, I informed them, was really funding their lavish lifestyle. My brother says it was a cruelly effective tactic .

There is something deeply primal about the notion of adoption. Children growing up in stable environments can use it to explore – or even exploit – their sense of security, while those without strong family ties can imagine being liberated into very different worlds. And it doesn’t get more different than the story of 13-month-old David Banda.

Since his mother died soon after he was born, the Malawian boy has lived in an orphanage in a remote bush community of mud huts and malaria. Then, last week, a superstar came to visit, took a shine to him, and whisked him off to his own suite in a luxury country club. Baby David now enjoys the personal attentions of a 10-strong entourage and all the advantages that Madonna’s £235 million fortune can command.

The 48-year-old singer, accompanied by film-director husband Guy Ritchie, went to Malawi to see what charitable donations such as her own are achieving in a country ravaged by poverty and Aids. The Home of Hope Orphan Care Centre in upcountry Mchinji was to have been just another stop on her whirlwind humanitarian tour, but then she met David and fell for him on the spot. “She was carrying the baby,” said a teacher who witnessed the encounter. “She was smiling and saying ‘ah, beautiful’.”

Within hours, arrangements were being put in place for the Ritchies to formally add David to their brood. “We were very happy,” said a spokesman for the boy’s father, who had handed his son over to the orphanage because he couldn’t cope with the cost of raising him. “We read the Bible and we thought ‘this is coming from God’.”

Madonna is used to being regarded as a pop deity, and is accustomed to getting what she wants. Trifling obstructions, such as the Malawi government’s long-standing ban on international adoption, were clearly not going to stand in her way. A pledge to foot the bill for a centre to feed, house and educate 4000 needy children may have helped her to become the first foreigner to be formally granted permission to adopt a Malawian baby since the country gained independence 40 years ago.

With apparently unseemly speed, a local court granted the Ritchies an interim order allowing them to take the boy into custody, and preparations were made to whisk him back to Britain by private jet to meet the other members of his new family, nine-year-old Lourdes, and Rocco, aged six.

IT probably never even crossed Madonna’s mind that she might face opposition. After all, David’s father had given his blessing and a cousin had said: “Here we are poor and we don’t have enough food. Now David can make a bright future.”

But others don’t see it that way. A Malawian child advocacy group is calling on the government to reverse the decision amid concerns that the country could gain a reputation as an easy place to pick up children, and the national Human Rights Commission believes adoption by foreigners carries great risks. “Anyone must be very, very concerned when you have these little children taken away from their natural homes. Yes, there is poverty; yes there is hunger. But we would prefer people from overseas to help our children here at home,” said a representative.

In Scotland, which has strong links with Malawi, there has been a similar outcry. Karen Gillon, MSP for Clydesdale, said: “I think it’s more about Madonna’s needs than the child’s. Perhaps the money she spends on [him] would have been better invested in the whole community. ”

In Hollywood, though, non- biological babies appear to be the accessory du jour. Tomb Raider star Angelina Jolie has a brace of them, and is reported to be planning more, while a host of other celebrities are regularly shown sporting exotic offspring like new handbags. The reaction to Madonna’s efforts might make them think again.

Michael Matheson, co-convener of the Scottish parliament’s cross-party group on Malawi, said: “This would appear to be the latest episode in the Hollywood fad. We shouldn’t underestimate the psychological damage this could cause to the children in the orphanage when they know a superstar is coming to choose a child and they know they weren’t picked.”

The row has certainly drawn attention to the plight of people living in the deepest deprivation. But, while it is tempting to celebrate the liberation of one tiny soul who might otherwise be condemned to a short life of abject poverty, it also raises uncomfortable questions about the rest of the world’s real commitment to supporting the growth of sustainable communities that can confidently care for their own.

Surely what David Banda’s people need most is help to educate their children, to grow the happy and healthy citizens of the future who will have the wherewithal and commitment to improve the national lot.

Maybe Madonna imagines she can help to achieve that by taking one little boy home. But millions of others must be left thinking “what about me?” This is the harsh reality of adoption – it looks as though the Home of Hope will have to remain just that for now.