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He won’t pay maintenance, and I literally can’t force him

I read with interest your article, 'Are you a man or a mouse?'

I thought I would share with you a little of my story and my difficulties with our maintenance system.

When you have read it, perhaps the plight of all those women that do not have the advantages I have will become even greater.  Perhaps someone might even do something about it.
 
I am a qualified but non-practising attorney, although I have practised law and chose to leave the profession after a time. I now work in a very senior position in a corporate environment. 

My background means I do understand more than most, our legal system, processes and protocol.
 
I married and had a daughter in 2003. After a very long difficult struggle with a philandering husband, I was divorced in 2008. 

The divorce agreement was quite clear on every aspect of maintenance, annual increases, mode and time of payment and of course contact. 

Before I come across as one of millions of bitter ex-wives, let me say that I understand fully that my war with my daughters sperm donor is not her war and in her eyes he remains her father. This means that I am at pains to ensure that my daughter enjoys regular contact with her father notwithstanding my own views on his lack of parental responsibility.

I am also remarried and now have the most wonderful, supportive husband, who is everything of a dad to my daughter that I could wish for.
 
My ex-husband has decided that the financial responsibility of raising our daughter should be mine alone and he should simply be her “Disneyland Dad”.  My view is that the financial responsibility of raising her is a joint one.  With this background in mind, let me tell you how my maintenance battle has played out.
 
“Maintenance” for my daughter was agreed to be a monthly payment, all inclusive. This means that I am responsible for meeting all education, aftercare, medical aid, entertainment, food and extra mural costs. 

Anyone that has a 10 year old and owns a calculator can soon work out that R4500 per month hardly covers much of these (and no, she does not attend a private school, I cannot afford one).
 
Within a few months of the Divorce being granted, maintenance stopped.  

That’s when I decided that I would approach our local maintenance court for assistance to enforce the High Court Order I had. I began the process on my own, after all, I am a trained attorney, how difficult could it be? The maintenance court is there for everyman so I should have found it a breeze to get through the paperwork and processes. 

More fool me. 

One look at the queues of gaunt and anxious faces standing outside the court at 7am (yes, Court only opens after 8) told me that the 2 hours I had allowed to get the process started was not likely to get me through. 

There is a “ticket” system in operation and if you are amongst the first 30 people to be at Court then you are issued a ticket and you wait on a wooden bench to be seen.

If you are unlucky number 31, you are sent away and told to come back again another day. Who knows how far number 31 may have travelled to be at court by 7am, but I digress. 

I was not lucky to get a ticket my first day, so the next day I was there at 6.45 and did manage to obtain a number.

I spent the entire day waiting on a wooden bench with other mothers holding small infants and managing toddlers to see the Maintenance Prosecutor. I had already compiled all my documents – an affidavit, bank statements to prove the default, a schedule of what was due and what had not been paid.  

With all of the right documentation my matter should have proceeded quickly and smoothly.
 
That first visit to the Maintenance Court happened early in 2009. 

Since then, I have been back so many times, I feel I should have a designated parking. Almost every month for 3 years I found myself in that building. 

After the first year, I had taken so much time off work I realised I could be jeopardising my own employment, so I engaged a very reputable and competent attorney to assist me. I then had to pay for the privilege of trying to get maintenance for my daughter. 

We were on first name terms with every prosecutor in that building and every clerk reacted with dread when we referred to my case file. 
 
It took my attorney until 2012 to finally get us to trial. 

We had postponements based on every conceivable reason – he was ill, his attorney was ill, his witnesses were ill, he was away, his attorney was not available, he didn’t receive notice of set-down, his witnesses were not available, he changed attorneys (this happened a number of times) and the new attorney needed time to prepare, and so it went on. 

He successfully managed to dodge the Sheriff and avoided the attachment of assets, he stopped using his bank account and used his girlfriends, he pleaded poverty (but bragged in private about his millions and clocked up numerous overseas visits) – he used every trick in the book to avoid contributing to his own daughter’s well-being.

All the while, he enjoyed visits from her every second weekend, half the holidays, alternating Christmas, Father’s Day etc.

I recall on one occasion, in desperation, when she was very young telling him that unless he started paying maintenance, I would stop the visits.

That ended with my daughter being prised from my arms by the SAPS at my gate and telling me that “maintenance and access are two separate matters and I should use the maintenance system rather than prevent access”.    
 
What was most astounding was that the very long serving specialist maintenance prosecutor (I’m talking more than 20 years’ service with our judicial system) asked for another criminal prosecutor to run the trial because he had never actually “prosecuted” one himself!

How many then, of the 31 tickets issued every day over 20 years, every resulted in a successful conviction in that court for failure to pay maintenance? 

So whilst our legislation promises to be in the best interests of our  children and to come down hard on defaulting contributors, I must question the willingness and or competence of those charged with enforcing it. 
 
By the time we finally got to trial, my attorney and I were so tired of my ex-husband’s  manipulative deception and flagrant disregard of and disrespect for the law, we requested that not only should he pay the arrear maintenance, but that he, in terms of legislation, be imprisoned. 

The magistrate hearing the matter was not impressed at all by his shenanigans and voiced her dissatisfaction with his conduct (which I believe fell on deaf ears), but was nonetheless reluctant to imprison him because she did not feel that “prison was the right place for him” so he was given a suspended sentence and ordered to make monthly contributions to the arrear maintenance. 
 
The threat of imprisonment is all that has kept him paying maintenance monthly and he has been doing so for the better part of two years now, but he still does not pay the full amount due, nor does he pay on or before due date – it’s always one or two days late and then always by cheque, which requires a further 10 day clearance.

Maintenance due on the 1st finally clears usually around the 19th or 20th of each month. 

Still, I say nothing because the mere thought of going back into the maintenance system again is enough to make me want to order a strait–jacket.  
 
The cherry on the top of all of this is that his previous TWO children (both by different mothers) were raised entirely without any financial input from him at all.  And he calls himself a father...
 
My heart goes out to all those mothers out there trying desperately to get the law to step in and assist with forcing “fathers” to contribute to the financial well-being of their progeny.
 
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