I m a SA male of 34 yrs. I live in Pretoria and have a 2yr daughter by a woman living 500 km away in Mpumalanga. I am paying maintenance for my child but i find it difficult to see and let my child visit me and my family in Pretoria. What dos the law say on matters such as my case above?

Hi F4J - That is so helpful and interesting, thanks very much for taking the time to give such a thoughtful answer.

@Fathers 4 Justice - you seem on quite a mission! He never said that they all lived in Pretoria to begin with. You seem to have a lot of anger probably from whatever happened to you. But don't judge every mother - some of us do the best and ENCOURAGE the visitation and contact...but sometimes the father just couldn't give a toss! So don't judge until you know the entire story- BOTH sides!

Hi, I am a 48 year old farther with three kids, my ex-wife held my children from me for 9 years when my smallest was only 5 years old and this was against a court order, you cannot beat them if a mother wants to hold the kids from you, the only thing on your side is time.
Now I see them were and when I like, your kids will always be your kids, just do the correct thing and pay maintenance and if you can pay more, don't' hold back money from them just because you cant see them, just keep trying, dont give up, one day your kids will come back to you, and one day, DAD will be DAD, this I tell you from an experience that I wish on no one.

Just be a good dad, make and effort to see your child and the mother will come round. Trust me.
I am a mother and I had to move far away because of money issues, one being the dad not paying his maintenance.
I will never keep my daughter away from her dad, but all I ask is for every step I take please take a step as well.
There are so many dad's out there that makes out to be such victims and I believe some are but as a rule, single mothers have a very tough job on their hands with dad's playing the victim all the time.
Good luck, and follow my advise, make an effort, you will be surprised to see how our attitudes change.

The mom and dad's arnt the victims, the kids are

This is the same case as mine. It took me 3 years to finaly have access, which includes removing the child for weekend. It is always difficult when the child is less than 5 years old. My child is still 650km away from my house, but I always say it worth it. I drive almost every two months to visit. She is now 5yrs. Sometimes police are involved since my ex is in the US and her mother (my child's grandmother) would refuse. She was arrested twice and promised her that this coming holiday I will have her charged if she removes or denies me a chance to remove my child for christma.

If you are on speaking terms with your ex - And if you have a support where you live - Maybe you can do holidays - FOr e.g - Take the two year old for two weeks every three months or so - But that means travel there to fetch her and take her back. But if your ex is a good mother and has good support where she lives -there is not much that you can do at the moment especially as the child is so young. When the child is older then school holidays will be your best bet.

To F4J....thank you for the helpful response...what happens when the father is not interested in the kids and you are struggling to raise them on your own as his not paying anything towards the kids, does it still mean that its child abuse to move to another city and what are my rights as a mother? How do I go about getting him to pay maintenance?

Thank you.

If my ex had custody and she left to work in the US leaving my child with her mother, I will instantly file for custody.
The legal cost does not have to be R500K or more, in the case where there is a custody battle it can end up to that amount, I think the original question was about access to the child, in such case it could start at R20 000, but to be safe use a figure of R50K, the best way would be to keep your side clean if the child live in Nelspruit in the past PTA high court had jurisdiction I do not know if it is still the case, but worth trying it any way, try and source Mrs E van Olst and ask that adv Mark Haskins represent you in court. First force your access, once the courts have made the order in your favor then if she refuse you access, I will still make sure that I involve a social worker or psychologist, this way you can have proof of your access which you can use in court, if she refuse you access more than twice in a row then you have grounds with the reports from the social worker or psychologist to charge her with contempt it will be difficult to explain her out of this, if found guilty she will get a six month prison sentence suspended for 5 years, I know of a couple of cases like this and believe me the problems stop there and then.
I have custody of both my kids my ex wife has gone as far as to lay false sexual abuse charges, she even requested a children court investigation, even gone as far as getting strings pulled by the chief public prosecuter where sister work to get a report stating that I have sexually abused my daughter, well if I let it be I am sure I would have been in jail today and had no access to my kids, her plan back fired I moved 1400 km away from her and the high court removed her access, this mean she can only see the kids under supervision. This type of allegations if not true can cause the same amount of damage to a child as if it was true, the law should change in such case if the mother only make allegations like that to get back at the father that she get a six month prison sentence, this way there will be more justice for fathers, I am extremely lucky and I only have God to thank, other unfortunate fathers is not so lucky and I know of some who has spend R600k out of stupidity, not prepared to follow good advice and got no where. The one that followed my advise settled saved a fortune and got access now with out a problem, his ex also tried the SAIDS (sexual allegation in divorce syndrome).