Child maintenance: When the father is self-employed…

The court is fair in passing judgement in cases where a non residential father is self-employed or does not have gainful employment. UCHIZI CHINULA, our guest writer, sheds light on the issue in this series on child maintenance.

As I alluded to in the previous article, when non-residential fathers abrogate responsibility. It raises human rights issues because the right to development of the mother is inadvertently violated since she now bears the financial burden alone. This may lead to violation of the child’s rights such as right to food, education and health care because the mother may not be able to adequately provide for her child.

It is important to consider who can receive child support payments. The law says that the person who has custody of a child who is the subject of a maintenance order is under a duty to receive and administer these funds for the benefit of the child. This means that the person who habitually takes care of the child and sees to their day-to-day needs will receive payment of these funds.

A copy of the maintenance order will be served on the local government officer responsible for the welfare of children in the area. This officer is legally bound to make quarterly reports to the Child Justice Court on how the child maintenance funds are being administered.

The reality is that the mother will indirectly benefit. To ensure that the child is the primary beneficiary of the maintenance funds, a local government officer dealing with the welfare of children in the area will assess how the funds are being administered and raise any concerns they have in their quarterly report submitted to the court.

It is clear how the law deals with employees who are liable to pay child maintenance. This begs the question that what happens when the liable party is not in full-time employment but controls their own money? The Child Care, Protection and Justice Act is silent on this.

Justice Edward Twea shed some light on this concern because he is chairperson of the National Child Justice Forum. He advised that where the person liable to pay child maintenance is self-employed and neglects to pay, the amount will be enforced like any other civil debt.

This means the sheriff’s department will seize any property that the father has, sell it and pay the amount into court. The court will proceed to pay the amount to the mother. He also pointed out that where a girl is impregnated by a man who has no means of supporting the child–for example, a student–an order for maintenance may still be granted but it is postponed until such a time when the father is in gainful employment.

I think we are steadily moving towards effective protection mechanisms for children and supporting mothers in this area.

Single mothers should not raise children on their own