INLSA

Mandla Mandela. Photo: Gcina Ndwalane

Mandla Mandela has hit back at a group of villagers who accuse him of expropriating their land in Mvezo to make way for a multimillion-rand hotel and stadium in the Eastern Cape village.

The chief’s subjects wanted to stop his development plans in their village, accusing him of disregarding their ancestral land and grave sites, which were to be moved to make way for the development.

When the matter was brought before the Mthatha Regional Court on Monday, Nelson Mandela’s grandson and heir dismissed the land grab claims against him as “scurrilous, ill-founded, defamatory and inflammatory”.

He said the three men who say they were representing the aggrieved families had no case as the right representatives of the three families involved had given the Mvezo Development Trust the green light to proceed with the development.

Mandela said the three representatives of the Tyalakhulu family, the head and representative of the Diniso family, and the head and representative of the Ngqosini clan all signed handwritten resolutions at a meeting on October 10 last year.

“They recorded that they commit as rightful owners of the land within the development site to the resolution of 2007 as facilitated by the department of land affairs… that the said property be part of development through the Mvezo development trust as the owning agency,” Mandela argued through his lawyers.

Mandela said the applicants had erred in suing him in his personal capacity in relation to phase two of the project as the Mvezo Development Trust and the Department of Tourism were the decision-making bodies.

- The Star