Herschelle Gibbs has been dragged to court to pay papgeld for his eight-month-old son.
The 45-year-old former Proteas cricket star appeared in the maintenance court last week where the mother’s lawyer, Juan Smuts, applied for R17 000 a month maintenance and R84 000 in pre-birth expenses.
The baby’s mother claims Gibbs is angry and not talking to her and wouldn’t even look at her. But she says the cricket ace is losing out in the process.
“Our baby is a gorgeous, easy-going child who loves everyone who connects with him. He’s my everything and I wouldn’t change it for anything in the world.”
Detailed expenses and DNA results proving Gibbs’ paternity accompanied the application for maintenance handed in the Cape Town Magistrates’ Court on Thursday, reports the Weekend Argus.
Gibbs was served with an interim order to pay R4 500 maintenance on 1 June and thereafter the same amount at the end of every month.
He was instructed to appear again on 1 August when the court will hear the mother’s application for R17 000 maintenance and birth costs.
The mother says she first met Gibbs about 10 years ago when he lived in a Camps Bay property that she was managing.
“He pursued me, but I was involved so I wasn’t interested,” she said.
They connected again in 2017 after she separated from her husband.
But their relationship was interrupted by her post-divorce plan to begin a new life in the US.
While in Texas for job interviews, on 16 February last year, she discovered she was pregnant.
She was initially shocked as pregnancy wasn’t in her plans, but then realised her baby was a “gift and a miracle”.
“Herschelle was in Kuwait at the time and I didn’t want to tell him over the phone. So I wrote a letter and asked a friend there to deliver it.
“I told him I was expecting his child in September and I hoped he would be as happy as I was. But his response was very negative. He turned ugly on me, telling me that I got pregnant on purpose.”
He then kept his distance from her, but last October insisted on a paternity test which proved positive.
“He did the blood test and left. And got his lawyer to send me a letter that he accepted that he was the biological father.”
Gibbs has declined to respond to queries.
“My client is unwilling to make any comments,” said his lawyer, Mandy Simpson.