Johannesburg – Television actress Pearl Thusi has kick-started a legal process to adopt the daughter of her recovering drug addict relative.
Thusi also wants her relative’s parental responsibility and guardianship to be terminated and to be granted to her so that she can raise the child.
The former Isidingo thespian has filed papers in the Joburg High Court in which she is asking for a court order to adopt the five-year-old girl, who, together with her mother, cannot be named for legal reasons.
In the papers, which we have seen, the former Real Goboza presenter said aprt from being a recovering drug addict, her relative, who also suffers from depression, lives in conditions in KwaZulu- Natal that were not conducive to raising the child, who is already living with her in Joburg.
She said the section of the town in which the relative lived was riddled with violent crime.
The relative, she added, also lived in a toxic environment under which they both did not want her daughter to be raised.
She also said the relative led a nomadic lifestyle and often lost cellphones, and therefore could not maintain regular contact with the child.
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She said in court papers that in the current residence that her relative lived in there was no room for the child, adding that the place was so bad that whenever she visited the relative during short and long school holidays, they met at a child-friendly and neutral place.
She said because the relative often lost cellphones, she would not impose restrictions on times during which the relative could make contact with the child, provided it was not at unreasonable hours or during school hours.
She also said in court papers that when her relative or other relatives wanted to see the child, she would rent a place in KwaZulu-Natal, which would be big enough to accommodate all family members so that they could bond with the child.
Thusi also stated that the child’s father, who also could not be named, did not want to be identified because he did not contribute financially towards her upbringing.
She said this was because her relative and the child’s father only had a brief relationship.
“The second applicant and I seek an order in, inter alia the following terms: ordering that I am awarded the sole parental responsibilities and rights of care and guardianship, as defined in terms of Children’s Act No 38 of 2005. Consequent upon the granting of the prayer above, ordering that the second applicant’s parental responsibilities and rights of care and guardianship in respect of [name withheld], as defined in terms of the act, are terminated,” she said.
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