‘Pay maintenance or be jailed’

A MULTIMILLIONAIRE who has refused to comply with a maintenance order, ordering him to pay just over R430 000 maintenance a month, has been jailed for contempt of court.

The parties involved in the litigation are married to each other but are in court for divorce proceedings.

The husband, according to court papers, went on luxurious holidays to Greece, Cyprus and France from June to September last year but said he could not afford the monthly maintenance due to a change in his personal circumstances.

He was found to have been in wilful contempt of the maintenance order issued last year.

A large portion of the said amount is a R280 000 bond instalment on an immovable property in Mooikloof, Pretoria, where the wife lives.

In the introduction to his judgment, acting high court judge Matthews Mojapelo said the man had told his wife: “Jail for me. Nothing for you.”

The husband had said this after the wife had obtained a maintenance order under Rule 43 against her husband.

From then on, the wife had struggled to get her husband to comply with the maintenance order.

The wife argued that her husband was in wilful default as he was able to afford the maintenance as per the court order but had chosen not to.

Her husband had submitted a “general denial” of the allegations.

According to the judgment, within a week of the order, the wife received a message from her husband which stated: “Jail for me, nothing for you, I do not have that kind of money anymore.”

The husband argued that after the maintenance order was issued, there was a drastic change in his income “as his companies are no longer generating income” and he had appealed for a variation of the order.

His application to the magistrate’s court was unsuccessful.

The husband said he could no longer afford the property he lived at and would move in with his parents after obtaining employment which would allow him a “steady income”.

However, his wife had submitted, in addition to being able to afford the lavish holidays, the court had also found that he had a monthly income of just over R1.1 million and “recently sold two properties for approximately R13m – yet he continues with his refusal to comply with the orders”.

Acting judge Mojapelo said: “In the circumstances, I find that the first respondent is in contempt of the court order of Molefe J of May 11, 2022.

“What makes the (husband’s) position more untenable is the fact that this court has already found him to be in contempt of the order by Molefe J, that is, the order by Ndlokovane AJ of June 17, 2022.

“There is no attempt to purge that order. In that order, the first respondent was already committed to prison. I still do not understand why the committal part of the order was not carried out.

“That, however, explains the general frustration that the applicant and most people in her position that are armed with maintenance orders in their favour are suffering on daily basis.”

Mojapelo ordered that the husband be jailed for 90 days for contempt of court.

The sentencing was suspended in its entirety for two years, on condition that he complied with the maintenance order within 72 hours of the judgment.