Khulubuse Zuma in Aurora court bid

130710 Aurora Boss Khulubuse Zuma at the press conference held in Melrose Arch.photo by Simphiwe Mbokazi 8

130710 Aurora Boss Khulubuse Zuma at the press conference held in Melrose Arch.photo by Simphiwe Mbokazi 8

Published Mar 1, 2015

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Johannesburg - The North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria will on Monday hear an urgent application by Khulubuse Zuma, a former director of Aurora Empowerment Systems, to have claims of R1.5 billion against Aurora set aside.

If the move succeeds, it may scupper efforts by the liquidators of Pamodzi gold mine to hold him and other directors, including Zondwa Mandela, nephew of former president Nelson Mandela, liable for R1.7bn over the stripping of the troubled Pamodzi mine plants in Springs and Orkney.

Appointed by the liquidators to manage the mines, Aurora instead allegedly stripped the infrastructure of the plants and sold it as scrap.

Hundreds of employees lost their jobs in the process and were forced to depend on handouts and soup kitchens for survival.

The application was postponed on Thursday because Zuma’s lawyer had left a file he needed for the proceedings in Durban.

Lawyers acting for Pamodzi have described Zuma’s application as a ploy to stop the court hearing the application by the liquidators that seeks to hold him and other directors personally liable for the R1.7bn. The hearing is set for next month.

In his bid, President Jacob Zuma’s controversial nephew cites the Master of the High Court in Pretoria, under whose oversight the winding-up of insolvent entities is undertaken, as the first respondent. The second is a “Mr Maphaha”, an employee of the master’s office, who presided in meetings of creditors at which the winding up of Aurora was decided.

He said the purpose of his application, brought in terms of the Insolvency Act and the Companies Act, was to have the court review Maphaha’s decisions as the presiding officer at the meeting on November 21, 2011 and February 22, 2012.

He argues the decisions of the meetings were “materially influenced by an error of law” and “taken in circumstances where relevant considerations were not considered and were improperly dictated by the representatives of the provisional liquidators of Aurora”.

“The decisions were taken in bad faith, for the reason that the decision/conduct are taken arbitrarily and capriciously, and are not connected to the information that was before the relevant respondents, inasmuch as the decisions are otherwise unlawful,” said Zuma.

He said the assertion made by the liquidators, that he was personally liable for the R1.7bn Aurora debts and the liquidators were creditors of Aurora, was wrong.

 

Zuma claimed to have been prejudiced because he was not present at the meetings of the creditors, where the “impugned decisions” were taken.

Sunday Independent

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