UK: High Court refuses father’s bid to take back son (11) ‘abducted’ from Zimbabwe by ex-wife; UK police intervene stop reverse ‘kidnapping’

By Staff Reporter

LONDON: A Zimbabwean man has failed with a High Court application for the return of his 11-year-old son who was taken without his knowledge to the United Kingdom by the mother.

Before approaching the family division of the London High Court, the father travelled to the UK and tried to take his son back to Zimbabwe only to be stopped by the police after his ex-partner reported a kidnapping.

The warring parents cannot be named to due to a legal requirement to protect the identity of the child.

Delivering his ruling, the judge insisted that the “anonymity of the children and members of their family must be strictly preserved.

“All persons, including representatives of the media, must ensure that this condition is strictly complied with. Failure to do so will be a contempt of court.”

Delivering ruling, the High Court, refused the father’s application, holding that his court‑ordered contact amounted to access rather than rights of custody and so removal of the child from Zimbabwe was not “wrongful” for Hague Convention purposes.

The feuding couple met in 2013 and the son was born a year later with the parents separating in 2017. The mother had custody of child and the father “frequent contact with him”.

Between 2019 and 2021 the mother worked in South Africa, while the child was looked after by the father. The mother regained custody when she returned in 2021.

However, in January 2022, a magistrate’s court in Zimbabwe granted the mother’s application for custody with the father awarded rights of access.

The court observed that “in the case of young children custody was usually given to the mother, and noting that the father was now married and living with his wife and other son”.

In August of the same year, the mother visited the local registry, changed “the child’s name and date of birth, and omitted mention of the father on the second notice of birth form”.

She then travelled to the United Kingdom in October where she lived with her sister and her husband.

“The father was telephoned on 24 October 2022 by (the son’s) headmaster, who sought reasons why he had been taken out of school, and informed the father that the maternal grandmother had returned the child’s books to the school stating that he will not be returning,” the court heard.

“The father says he did not hear anything about them until 2024 when he received a voice note of his sone from the mother, in which the boy had an English accent.

“The father then discovered that one of the mother’s sisters was living in England. In November 2024 the father ascertained the address (of the sister), and the father’s brother visited them.”

He later travelled to the United Kingdom in February this year and was able to meet his son, spending two nights with the boy at his hotel.

“On 24 February 2025 the father and (son) attended the Zimbabwean embassy to make arrangements to take him back to Zimbabwe,” reads the court record.

“However, the mother did not attend, and she told (the boy’s) school that he had been kidnapped by the father. The school called the police, who removed (the child) from the father’s care.”

On 14 April 2025 the father applied for a Return Order under the Hague Convention articles relating to the wrongful removal or the retention of a child.

In his determination, Vikram Sachdeva KC, sitting as a Deputy High Court Judge, found that under Zimbabwean common law a custodial parent may relocate abroad unless a court order expressly restricts removal; an access‑only parent has no veto or right to consultation.

The judge concluded that the father’s (access) rights did not include a power to prevent (the child from) leaving Zimbabwe.

Applying the Convention’s autonomous concepts, the court held that the father’s rights were not “rights of custody”

“I do not construe the father’s rights as extending to a power of veto…” and “the rights enjoyed by the father do not constitute ‘rights of custody’,’ the judge said.

Addressing the mother’s defences on settlement, despite significant concealment – including identity changes and years without paternal contact – the judge found that the child was “well‑settled physically and psychologically in England, integrated at school and in the community”.