Judge gives dad go-ahead to fetch his children
A judge has given permission for a Cape Town father to drive to Bloemfontein to collect his two children who are in lockdown with their grandparents.
According to a Times Select report, the father, a doctor, approached the Western Cape High Court for permission to make the 2000km round trip after his 68-year-old arthritic mother became exhausted by having to care for the children, who are seven and 10.
Judge Yasmin Meer gave him the go-ahead and ordered the Social Development Department to pay the parents’ legal costs after criticising its ‘curious refusal to enter into a settlement agreement’.
The court order says the children’s father can drive to his parents’ Free State home, spend the night, then drive the children home.
Meer said the children would be able to travel to their mother’s home (the parents are divorced) once she had a doctor’s certificate indicating that she had tested negative for Covid-19.
In an affidavit, department legal head Nkosinathi Dladla said the lockdown regulations did not permit the movement of children from a parent to a caregiver or vice versa.
However, Meer said: ‘The unrefuted evidence makes clear that the task of caring for the children by the grandparents is already proving not to be sustainable and this will only continue and be exacerbated over a further prolonged period. The wellbeing and physical health of the children in these turbulent times are being placed at risk. The situation is clearly an urgent and troubling one. The best interests of the children would undoubtedly be served if permission were to be granted for them to be fetched to travel from Bloemfontein to Cape Town.’
Article disclaimer: While we have made every effort to ensure the accuracy of this article, it is not intended to provide final legal advice as facts and situations will differ from case to case, and therefore specific legal advice should be sought with a lawyer.
