A Namibian man who argued that his estranged wife should be able to financially support herself has been ordered to continue paying her R20,000 per month for her maintenance.
On top of this, the man will have to pay a monthly R35,000 towards her rent in Cape Town and R17,500 for each of their two children.
Acting judge of the Western Cape High Court Adrian Montzinger ruled that the man’s duty to support his family had not fallen away simply because he expected she would have become economically self-sufficient by a given date.
The court ordered the man to start paying from May 25.
He was also ordered to retain the woman and the minor children as beneficiaries on his current medical aid scheme and also pay for their schooling and helper.
The court also said the man should contribute R50,000 towards the woman’s past legal costs in the divorce action and R125,000 towards her future legal costs.
According to the judgment, the couple were married out of community of property in August 2014 at Windhoek, Namibia.
The accrual system was excluded by their antenuptial contract.
The couple lived a comfortable life in an upmarket secure estate and travelled internationally.
The family moved to Johannesburg in 2016, where they lived until their separation at the end of October 2023.
In December 2024, the wife and the children relocated to Cape Town, while the husband returned to Windhoek, where he now lives with his current partner.
His wife issued summons for divorce in June 2025.
The man had been financially supporting his family while the wife remained unemployed.
In her maintenance application, she argued that the money her husband has been paying was no longer enough to maintain her and the children.
She said her monthly household expenses were R108,115.
According to the judgment, the woman alleged that when they left Joburg in 2024, the man agreed to continue to pay for the children’s school fees, educational expenses, the medical aid for all of them and accommodation.
The woman and her minor children live in a home that they rent for R35,000 a month.
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They initially rented another property from December 2024 until May 31 2025 that was renewed until November 2025.
The monthly rental was R28,800.
Their children attend an expensive private school and have a live-in helper and other domestic assistance.
However, the man argued that he should not be paying any rental because he agreed to pay for only one year, and that obligation ended in November last year.
The man said he expected the woman to have been employed by then.
He also argued that the woman had access to the residue of the R250,000 paid out of the Property Trust in October 2025, which, he said, was sufficient to defray the rental until the end of July 2026.
In addition, he said the woman had her own savings of R225,000 and that, in due course, she will receive an amount of money from him in the divorce.
But Montzinger said: “The amount sought for rental is the actual rental of the premises in which the applicant and the children currently live. It is not a figure plucked from the air by the applicant. It is the amount fixed by the lease that was concluded in November 2025 to replace the previous lease, the judge said.
Montzinger said the man had not seriously contended that R35,000 per month was unreasonable for the kind of accommodation the family requires in Constantia.
Montzinger added that the man did not contest his liability to pay personal maintenance.
The court found that the woman had been unemployed throughout the marriage of more than 11 years.
“There is no suggestion in the papers that she will be in a position, in the near future, to generate any meaningful income.
“The respondent’s contention that she ought already to have done so is a contention for consideration in the divorce action; it does not affect the quantum of pendente lite maintenance which falls to be assessed against the applicant’s present circumstances,” said the judge.
Sowetan
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