BANK ACCOUNTS OF LAND GRABBERS TO STAY FROZEN
The North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria today ruled that the bank accounts of two organisations, representing the land grabbers in the Wallmannsthal area, must remain frozen until the more comprehensive eviction processes have been finalised in court.
In January this year, AfriForum supported members of the Wallmannsthal Communal Property Association, who are the legitimate entitlement holders of a piece of state owned land at Wallmannsthal north of Pretoria, after a breakaway faction, led by a 'suspended police captain', a certain Captain Makene, had begun to take matters in its own hands by selling land in the Wallmannsthal area arbitrarily to land grabbers.
AfriForum obtained the particulars of the bank accounts used by the land grabbers to receive deposits made by members of the public, who had "purchased" stands in the occupied area, and in January the court was asked to freeze those bank accounts pending the finalisation of the eviction process.
An urgent court order was then granted but the account holders, who had already transferred R300 000 of the disputed monies in the meantime to the personal account of a surveyor, a certain Mr Sadiki, then approached the court asking that the interdict in terms of which the accounts are frozen be lifted. AfriForum supported the Communal Property Association in opposing the application.
The court today dismissed with costs the disputed account holders' application to have the accounts unfrozen.
AfriForum will continue to support the Wallmannsthal community because the situation at Wallmannsthal has become an example of the anarchy that develops when land is occupied arbitrarily by the alleged claimants of it.
The eviction order handed down by Judge Joseph Raulinga in February has not yet been implemented by the state because the occupiers have since delivered a notice of appeal. Upon closer inquiry, AfriForum found that the notice of intent to appeal was only served on parties to the litigation but was never filed in the court's files.
There is a suspicion that in so doing the occupiers are abusing legal processes to frustrate the implementation of the eviction order. After intervention from AfriForum this matter has now been referred to the relevant judge, and the application for leave to appeal will be heard shortly. AfriForum will oppose the application, and should the application for leave to appeal fail, the eviction of illegal squatters from the area will proceed.
Statement issued by Willie Spies, AfriForum's legal counsel, March 22 2012
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