AP

Lilongwe, Malawi, Oct 12: Madonna danced with children and an elderly woman at the site of an orphanage her charity is building in Mphandula, a village 50 kilometers (30 miles) outside the Malawian capital, Lilongwe on Wednesday.

She spoke briefly to villagers, but did not comment to reporters and did not address reports that she had adopted a 1-year-old Malawian boy whose mother died a month after childbirth, made by the baby's father claimed.

Malawian government officials said last week the pop star planned to adopt a Malawian boy whilst in the impoverished African nation visiting projects she funds for AIDS orphans.

However, they declined to comment on Yohame Banda's claim that his son David had been adopted by the singer.

Madonna has made no comment to reporters since her arrival.

Her publicist, Liz Rosenberg, said in an e-mailed statement on Wednesday, "I am unable to make any official statement at this time" on the adoption reports.

In a statement last week, Rosenberg said that the star was on a private visit working on projects for children, and dismissed statements from Malawian government officials that she and her husband, film director Guy Ritchie, planned to adopt a boy.

On Tuesday, 32-year-old Banda said, "I am the father of David, who has been adopted. I am very very happy because as you can see there is poverty in this village and I know he will be very well looked after in America."

He said his wife Marita died a month after the baby's birth from childbirth complications and the child had been cared for at the Home of Hope Orphan Care Centre in Mchinji, a village near the Zambian border.

Banda said his son left the orphanage on Monday and was taken to the capital, Lilongwe, where Madonna and her entourage were staying in an upscale ranch.

Madonna arrived in Malawi on October 4 to visit her Raising Malawi project, which is setting up an orphan care centre to provide food, education and shelter for up to 4,000 children.

It will have projects based on Kabbalah, Judaism's mystical sect, which counts the 48-year-old singer among its devotees.

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

Malawi is among the poorest countries in the world, with rampant disease and hunger, aggravated by periodic droughts and crop failure.

Some 14 percent of its 12 million people are infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, and an estimated 1 million children have been orphaned.

In many villages, grandparents or older siblings struggle to feed orphans.