Office of the Family Advocate

The Office of the Family Advocate is involved in the evaluation and recommendation to the relevant
Court upon written request by a party in a divorce action or application related to disputes over
primary care or contact or any aspect of parental rights of children.

Many divorced parents or unmarried parents face the scourge of parental alienation perpetrated by
the other parent. Parental alienation involves the systematic brainwashing, poisoning and
manipulation of children with the sole purpose of destroying a loving and warm relationship they
once shared with a parent.  As everyone knows, divorces can often be acrimonious. Add children to
the mix, and the animosity heightens even more, as both parents strive to do what they feel is in the
best interests of the children. At times these efforts evolve into accusations that the other parent is
“bad” causing the child to side with one parent over his/her dislike for the other. This world is rife of
parents using their children as pawns in the dirty game of divorce or where children are born out of
wedlock. We have all heard of the old saying “no maintenance no kids” or “you left me so you won’t
see your kids”. Parents don’t realise the damage they are doing in using their children as a means to
get back at the other parent.

So often you hear about a mother complaining that a father sexually abused a child, with no
evidence to substantiate the claim, simply in an attempt to isolate the father from having a
relationship with the child or a mother obtaining a restraining order against a father simply to
restrain the father from having a relationship with a child. It is so prevalent that legal practitioners
even have a term for this: they call it SAID – Sexual Allegations in Divorce. Although it seems to be
mostly women that play this deadly game, there are also fathers who use their children as pawns
against the mother. Unfortunately in battles of this sort attorneys are sometimes also to blame and
fuel the battles on behalf of a client losing sight of what the best interest of a child really means.
Depriving the other parent of a relationship with his/her children is possibly one of the most devious
methods to ruin a solid society.

“Parental Alienation Syndrome” (PAS), is a term first used by the late child psychiatrist Richard A.
Gardner in 1985. Dr. Gardner studied the behaviour of parents involved in child custody disputes. He
noted that sometimes the children align themselves with one parent. While this is natural to a
degree, Dr. Gardner noticed that in some cases it could be extreme to the point it borders on a
physiological disorder. He described the so-called disorder or syndrome as follows:

“Its primary manifestation is the child’s campaign of denigration against the parent, a campaign that
has no justification. The disorder results from the combination of [either deliberate or unconscious]
indoctrinations by the alienating parent and the child’s own contributions to the vilification of the
alienated parent”.

The American Psychiatric Association has adding PAS to the new edition of the Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, that was published in May 2013. William Bernet, a professor
of psychiatry at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine and an advocate for its inclusion in the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, describes it as “a mental condition in which a  child,
usually one whose parents are engaged in a high conflict divorce, allies himself or herself
strongly with one parent, and rejects a relationship with the other parent, without legitimate
justification.”

The form of PAS most experienced is that of negative words by one parent about the other, leading
the child’s thoughts and attitudes in the same direction. The alienating parent might also cause the
child, through manipulation and access blocking, to unjustifiably fear and/or hate the target parent.
The parent with primary residence may engage in direct and indirect methods designed to alienate
the child from his or her non-residential parent. As a result the child becomes preoccupied with
unjustified criticism and hatred of the non-residential parent. This sometimes lead to brainwashing
which result in conscious acts of programming the child against the other parent”. Examples include
accusing the father of being an “adulterer” and “deserter.” The father is unjustifiably accused of
providing too little maintenance, sometimes to the point that the mother misleads the children to
believe that terrible things will happen to them. When a father leaves the home, the mother may
make statements such as, “your father has abandoned us,” to teach the child that the rejection
extends not only to the mother but to the c. children as well. Minor negative attributes on the
father’s side are exaggerated greatly. For example, the father who occasionally has a drink after
dinner is described as an alcoholic.

Section 35 of the South African children’s act criminalizes the refusal to allow someone access or
who holds parental responsibilities and rights in terms of a court order or a parental responsibilities
and rights agreements that has taken effect, to exercise such access or parental responsibilities and
rights. It also criminalizes prevention of the exercise of such access or parental responsibilities and
rights. Punishment for any of these offences is a fine or imprisonment for up to one year. The
section further obliges a person who co-holds parental rights and responsibilities with another
person in terms of an agreement or court order to notify the other party in writing immediately of
any change in his/her residential address. Failure to notify such party will result in an offence.