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Legal Talk
Legal Talk
Date: 2017-06-09
Failure to abide a court order could mean imprisonment for contempt of court
The moment the court makes it's ruling on a matter, the terms of that court order are binding on the parties to whom it relates. Failure to abide the court order means being in contempt of that court order. Failure to abide a court ruling means that a person could face imprisonment.
The courts unsurprisingly, take an uncompromising stance on any person who fails to abide by its ruling. The committal of a person to imprisonment under these circumstances, is seen as being valuable and necessary to ensure upholding of the rule of law and is one which "survives constitutional scrutiny".
The Western Cape High Court dealt with the issue of contempt of court and imprisonment of a man in a case where a man failed to abide an existing Rule 43 divorce proceedings court order.
The man who is presently embroiled in divorce proceedings against his wife was ordered in 2015 to pay an amount of R100 000,00 per month, being interim maintenance, to his wife until the divorce itself was finalized. The man failed to adhere to the court order and fell into arrears with his maintenance.
The wife then brought a contempt of court application against the husband, asking that he be found to be in contempt of court and that he be imprisoned for 30 days, suspended on condition that he pays the arrear maintenance.
To succeed for a contempt of court application, the wife simply needed to prove (a) the existence of a court order; (b) the husband had knowledge of it; and (c) the husband failed to comply with the court order. Once she established that, the onus then shifted to the husband who needs to prove that his failure to pay was not willful nor mala-fides (in bad faith).
The husband brought a counter application asking inter alia that the wife's application be dismissed. He said that the business from which he derived his income was doing poorly and therefore he could not afford to meet the obligations set by the court.
The man was unsuccessful in his counter application and was criticized by the court using the incorrect legal process and form. He was also criticized for the fact that he failed to produce any supporting evidentiary proof in the way of bank statements or other records to support his contentions regard that the business was not doing well.
More importantly he was chastised for bringing his counter application without having the contempt of court purged first. On 31 May 2017, the court ruled against the man and ordered the man's committal to imprisonment for 30 days, suspended for one year on condition the man pays the arrear amount within 14 days of the court order.
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