Ulrich Roux & Venter Incorporated

URA SECURES FATHER’S RIGHT TO UNSUPERVISED CONTACT AND SUCCESSFULLY OBTAINS CONTEMPT ORDER

URA’s Storm Roux, together with Clarisse Scheepers, Carlé Kriedemann and Counsel obtained a successful outcome for our client, an unmarried father in proceedings concerning contact with his 22-month-old son.

The matter arose after the mother unilaterally sought to restrict the father’s Court Ordered contact and insisted that contact be supervised. The father had agreed to a period of supervised contact on an interim basis. Thereafter, he insisted on the enforcement of the existing Court Orders after extensive supervision by social workers confirmed him to be a capable and loving parent.

Following urgent proceedings in the Johannesburg High Court (and the mother’s urgent counter variation application), the Court reaffirmed the father’s right to unsupervised contact and directed the mother to comply with the existing contact regime.

In a strongly worded judgment, the Court held: “The proper functioning of the judicial system depends on the foundational principle that court orders must be obeyed until they are set aside by a competent court. To hold otherwise would invite chaos and encourage litigants to resort to self-help, a course of action that our courts have repeatedly condemned.”

The Court found the mother in contempt of Court, reinstated the father’s unsupervised contact with immediate effect, sentenced the mother to 30 days’ imprisonment wholly suspended for 36 months, and ordered her to pay the father’s legal costs for both the urgent and counter application.

This matter serves as an important reminder that neither parent may unilaterally disregard or interfere with a child’s relationship with the other parent when both parties hold equal rights and responsibilities and especially where contact is regulated by a Court Order. The judgment reaffirms that the best interests of children remain paramount and solidifies the importance of the meaningful involvement of both parents in a child’s life.