Joy Of a Family Reunited

He had to resort to a daring kidnap to get his Mijah back – now Michael is the happiest dad in the world.

- Almari Wessels

HE HAS a huge smile as he sits on the couch in his home in Port Elizabeth, an arm around each of his daughters.

Michael Kliment will never take the simple joy of such an ordinary moment for granted again – not after the battle he’s had to get his younger daughter home.

At the end of June, desperate after being separated from Mijah for almost four years, Michael travelled to Slovakia and “kidnapped” her from outside her school.

Then they went on the run from Interpol for five weeks (YOU, 28 July).

They crossed the border into Hungary and spent weeks moving around Europe before a court finally decided Mijah belongs with her father in South Africa and not with his late ex-wife’s parents in Slovakia. Michael, a 43-year-old businessman, is ecstatic.

“I have both my daughters with me now – what more could a father want? The best part is waking up every morning with her here. There are 10 million teddy bears in her bedroom – there’s no space for her to sleep!”

Mijah has been home for only four days but it’s clear the energetic youngster has her dad and older sister, Mikaila (18), wrapped around her finger.

“When I walked in here this morning Mijah was curled up in Dad’s bed watching TV,” says Mikaila, Michael’s daughter from a previous relationship.

She travelled with her dad to Slovakia in June to “kidnap” her little sister. In our earlier article Mijah was referred to as Anja to protect her identity because the legal side of things hadn’t been sorted out yet.

Mijah is happy to be back in South Africa and to have reclaimed the pretty toy-filled bedroom she has in her dad’s seafront home.