I would say that at least one third of all my divorce cases involve one spouse applying for an “interim protection order” against the other spouse. Other commonly used terms for this are “interdict” or “restraining order”. They are all the same though and must be applied for at the nearest court to which you reside.
In South Africa there is just so much domestic violence and all that you can really do is apply for a protection order if you think that your soon-to-be-ex may during the course of the divorce proceedings become abusive towards you, your children or anybody else. South Africa is the country in the world with one of the highest crime rates. Recent statistics show that the murder rate has dropped by 2% recently to “just” 49,1 murders a day. It is just so important to protect yourself.
In a recent newspaper article there was the following headline: “Man skiet sy vrou, kinders voor ouma”. It is really shocking to read something like this. The parties were going through a divorce. Mr. Wim Koning (52) was separated from his wife, Rendi (43) and they had had two young children. They all however went on a family outing in the Kruger National Park one day, together with Rendi's mother.
On returning that day the wife dropped Mr. Koning off at his house and went in quickly to fetch a toy which belonged to their one child and which had been left behind when she moved out the home. Just before they drove off something snapped in Mr. Koning. He fetched a 9mm pistol in the house and shot his family in the car. They all died. His mother-in-law survived. He later also killed himself.
In the abovementioned case what is quite bizarre is that Rendi had recently obtained a protection order against Wim. This was however not enough to stop her losing her life with her children. It appears she did all that she could though to protect herself.
I have had cases of men and women abusing and harassing each other so badly that the police have had to be called on several occassions to sort out the problem. The only time they will lock somebody up is if the one party is in breach of a protection order, as that is a valid court order. My one client had his shop window smashed with a brick by his wife, from whom he was separated. He simply had to get a protection order against her to prevent this from re-occuring.
Some people can simply not deal with all the pressures involved in getting divorced. They inevitably end up harassing and abusing their soon-to-be-ex. All that the aggrieved party can really do to protect himself or herself is to get a protection order.
I would estimate that a protection order is effective in about 80% 90% of all cases. The Koning family incident as mentioned above is really an exception. It is quite probable that Mr. Koning may not have been sound of mind when doing what he did.
article written by Cape Town lawyer, Peter M Baker
petermbaker@yahoo.com