Hard-up star wants financial freedom
Former Isibaya actress Florence Segal-Mokgatsi’s one-year marriage to husband James Segal is crumbling like her acting career.
Segal-Mokgatsi has dumped her husband after complaining that he refused to give her shares in his two Mpumalanga guest houses which she was managing for him.
She also moaned that her husband fulminated against her attendances of the night parties and social gatherings she graced in a bid to reviv her floundering career so she could be financially independent.
The revered motivational speaker has already vacated their matrimonial house in Northriding, Joburg with thei only child, and is now living i her other pad in the same suburb.
News that the lovebirds, who walked down the aisle in 2017, were no longer flocking together, are contained in court papers filed by Segal-Mokgatsi at the high court in Joburg a fortnight ago, opposing Segal’s demand for the custody of their child.
Demanding the custody of the child, Segal said their marriage disintegrated about three months ago when the actress, who stopped acting two years ago, wanted to stop assisting him from running the lodges and go back to acting.
He said although he disapproved of her intention to return to what he called her “glamour life of acting” and the social events that are associated with show business, she defiantly did so and would return home late at night.
Segal said when he asked why she was obstinate, she told him that in order to get acting roles and gigs again, she needed to attend these events so she could be seen by prospective employers.
“This entails her having to stay out until very late at night, even to the early hours of the morning. I have tried to be supportive of the applicant, but her chosen lifestyle, the cost to maintain it and devaluation it has on our family have just become too much for me to bear,” read the papers.
He further said the events she attended were often brimming with alcohol and sometimes she would return home drunk. He also said the thespian recently returned sloshed from an event in Bloemfontein when she was supposed to be at home nursing their sick child.
In her responding affidavit, the trouper refuted Segal’s allegations and said she ventured into the acting industry when she was 14 years old and was able to buy herself a car and property as she was financial independent.
She said all that changed when she fell pregnant in 2017 while acting on Isibaya and, as a result, her contract was cancelled, thus costing her a source of income.
She said they had agreed that she would manage his two guest houses as he had a fulltime job at a car dealership in Pretoria.
She said she became financially dependent on her husband and that put a strain on their marriage because he questioned every transaction she would make and even shouted at her if she bought anything that was not for the household.
She said in February she asked him to give her shares i the guest houses as he was no paying her a salary for managing them but he refused.
“James’s refusal to allow me financial independence forced me to return to my marketing studies with Unisa, which my family is paying for, and my acting career in an attempt to earn an income and be financially independent,” reads her affidavit.
She said she vacated their matrimonial house on October 2 after failing to convene a family meeting on March 22 to resolve their differences.
By Ngwako Malatji
