Ashwaq Al-Tuwairqi Okaz/Saudi Gazette MAKKAH — A divorced mother of a 10-year-old disabled child demanded the Makkah General Court to reconsider its recently-issued verdict which absolved the father from the responsibility to pay child support for his daughter. The judge based his verdict on the fact that Ghazal, the little girl, receives government aid of SR833 a month; therefore, the mother does not have the right to ask the father to provide for his daughter. However, the judge required the father to pay SR15,000 child support for the past three years, during which he failed to provide for his daughter. Ghazal's mother is still in shock following the court's verdict and cannot understand why the judge denied her daughter the right to child support although the Shariah endorses such right and requires the divorced father to spend money on his children according to his financial capability. Ghazal's father does not have any financial problems and is capable of supporting his daughter, according to the mother. Ghazal was born with a congenital microcephaly (the condition of having a significantly smaller head) and brain atrophy. She suffers from major delay in development. Although she started walking at two years old, she can barely utter understandable words. On top of that, she has moderate “retardation” and extremely weak vision. “My daughter needs visual, audio, psychological, and kinetic care. I attached a medical report to the judge overseeing the case and explained that Ghazal needs several medications on a monthly basis to control her hyperactivity. It costs me SR2,500 a month to take care of Ghazal, that is three times the aid we get every month.” Over the past three years, the mother's parents had been taking care of Ghazal's expenses. Besides this, the mother had to find work and leave Ghazal in her old parents' care. When the mother tried to enroll the child in special public schools, her applications were rejected because Ghazal's IQ is below average. The only specialized center which accepted Ghazal was a private one and it charges SR15,000 in tuition fees which the mother cannot afford. The child was put on the waiting list in the hope that a philanthropist might come forward and pay the fees. Sultan Al-Harthy, legal consultant who took on Ghazal's case, is himself surprised by the verdict. “In Shariah, a guardian must provide for his children. How could the judge have absolved the father of such responsibility? I don't understand this. It's obligatory upon the father to pay medical expenses as well as other living expenses for his daughter.” “The sad thing is that the judge knows that the mother gets an insufficient amount of SR833 a month as child support,” Al-Harthy said.
