Eight-year-old Kartika Arditza got an unpleasant surprise Thursday when a court execution team came to her school to separate her from her mother, Meilita Floriana, 29.
Kartika covered her face with the back of her hand while crying and calling out to her mother, who did not know what was happening to her daughter.
"Mama, Mama. Help me, help me. I don't want to go with them," she cried out.
Kartika's father William Wijnberg and his father Roni Wijnberg arrived at the school to pick Kartika up at 8:30 a.m.
The Indonesians of Dutch descent were accompanied by Wijnberg's lawyer Mustahdi and an execution team from the Tangerang District Court. The team was led by the team's chairman Suryadarma.
The Ora et Labora elementary school at Bumi Serpong Damai did not allow the execution team to take Kartika until her mother showed up.
Meilita showed up an hour later with tears in her eyes.
The drama began in 2004 when Meilita filed for a divorce with Kartika's father. After the divorce, the couple began a battle over the custody of their daughter.
William filed a legal suit against Meilita for their daughter's custody.
William demanded the court give custody to his father, Roni.
"Meilita is a night worker and she always returns home in the morning. This is the main reason the South Jakarta district court believed she would not be able to educate and raise the child," Mustahdi said.
He said the South Jakarta court granted custody to Kartika's grandfather because it found her mother could not ensure the wellbeing of the child.
Meilita begged to differ.
"You can see my daughter is healthy. I can send her to a good school. I am able to raise her. So, please don't separate us," Meilita begged in tears.
Suryadarma said the Tangerang District court had been delegated to carry out the decision of the South Jakarta District court.
"This is the first case in Tangerang where the right has been taken from the child's mother and given to a grandparent," he said.
Mustahdi said the execution team was necessary because Meilita did not obey the court's orders. The lawyer said Meilita always tried to postpone handing over Kartika to her grandfather.
Meilita could not hold back her tears when the team read out the Supreme Court's decision over the child's custody again at the school.
But she could not do much and had to let her daughter go with her former husband and former father-in-law.
According to William, taking the child and having custody over her would not spoil the relationships between his former wife's relatives and his own relatives, which he said had been good so far.
"Meilita and her relatives can see Kartika at my parents' home whenever they like. We will never stop them from doing so as she did when my relatives and I wanted to see my daughter," he said.
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