In an application concerning two small children whose parents have died, a tug-o-war has erupted between their elderly grandparents and their uncle as to who should take care of the children.

According to a Pretoria News report, their father left a will in which he stated that the grandparents should take care of them.

But it was stipulated that if the grandparents could not look after the children, a specific uncle was earmarked as the alternative carer.

The uncle  turned to the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria), where he asked that the children be placed in his care. He said the grandparents are not up to it, their circumstances at home are not conducive towards the raising of the children and they are mismanaging the money that the father had left for the children.

Both families live in an upmarket Golf Estate in Centurion, within about 100 meters of each other.

Judge Anthony Millar noted that the present litigation has gone on for five years.

‘While it may have been instituted with the intention of quickly resolving the differences of opinion between the parties, it has become a progressively more acrimonious battle of wills and test of stamina.’

According to the Pretoria News, a court earlier ruled that pending the fight, the uncle and his family may see the children on certain days. The fight has now heated up to such an extent, that the grandparents are refusing the uncle to ever see the children.

A curator who was appointed to act in the best interests of the children reported to the court that the grandparents refused to accept the authority of the court regarding the order that the uncle may have access to the children.

The court was told that the children were used by the maternal grandparents as pawns in the litigation, to the extent that one of the grandparents began to ‘collect evidence’ by secretly recording what transpired during therapy with the children to fortify their case.

It also emerged that the grandparents' adult daughter moved into the house, and later her fiancé. All are being sustained financially from money left for the children’s care. 

Millar noted that none involved in the litigation over the years were spared by the grandfather – including the judges who had delivered judgments in the matter as well as the experts who gave their opinions to the court.

‘His approach evidences at best for him, a stubborn inability to appreciate that it is the court and not him, which is the upper guardian of the minor children and at worst a cynical and destructive conduct of litigation motivated by his own desire to maintain the status quo for selfish financial reasons,’ Millar said.

Full Pretoria News report in The Star

Judgment