Johannesburg - The luxurious marquee that was almost blown up by right-wingers during the ANC’s Mangaung conference is at the centre of a R7.4 million legal tussle.
David Naidoo has accused the ruling party of failing to honour a 2012 multimillion-rand deal reached with his company M&M Marquee.
A letter that sealed the deal, annexed to court papers filed in the high court in Joburg and signed off by then ANC treasurer-general Mathews Phosa, indicates that the ANC requested services in the form of marquees, draping and decor, VIP toilets, carpeting and flooring, tables, chairs, lounge suites, air-conditioning, sound and stage, as well as cutlery and crockery.
But, two years after the party’s elective conference that sealed Jacob Zuma’s second-term presidency, there is a dispute over payments.
The ANC had undertaken to pay 50 percent of Naidoo’s bill upfront, 25 percent when 75 percent of the job was “completed, assessed and approved by the ANC”, and 25 percent on the day of completion.
Naidoo has lodged a R7.4m claim and applied to the court to place the ANC under a winding-up order because it had failed to pay its debt.
“I aver that the respondent is, at the least, commercially insolvent as it is unable to pay its debts,” he stated in court papers. “I emphasise that the respondent does indeed possess assets, the full extent of which not being within my knowledge, and hence the need for a liquidator to be appointed in order to investigate and determine the full extent of the respondent’s assets.
“I humbly aver that it will be to the advantage of creditors that the estate of the respondent be wound up.”
But the party’s treasurer-general, Zweli Mkhize, has dismissed Naidoo’s claim as “frivolous”.
Mkhize told The Star on Tuesday: “First, that’s a frivolous claim, it has no basis. He’s taking a blind chance because he thinks he can make money from the ANC.”
The matter, which had been postponed from September to this month, is being fought out of court because there is a dispute over who is the rightful company owed by the ANC.
Naidoo’s lawyer, Martin Speier, said: “Yes, there’s a dispute… we’re trying to settle it.”
But Mkhize said there was a third party – MNM Marquee and Hiring – owned by Samisto Mashita – which had also laid claim to the money owed.
“We couldn’t pay because they (Naidoo and Mashita) were embroiled in a fight. As far as the ANC is concerned, it’s not him (Naidoo) who should be claiming liability… it’s someone else. So that is the problem, so we don’t take that case seriously. We think that… we’ll show in court that it is not so,” said Mkhize.
Mashita said he had bailed Naidoo out when he faced liquidation, co-founding a company with a similar name with Naidoo’s daughter.
“He (Naidoo) needed somebody to rescue him, but I could not rescue him by buying shares, so I started MNM Pty Ltd. So out of the Pty, I paid R5m to Mr Naidoo to buy the assets of the cc, not the company but the assets he owned.
“We went back to the ANC to say: due to the acquisition, please change the cc to the Pty. The ANC then rewrote a letter to the Pty.
“Now that’s the company that did the job.
“Me and Mr Naidoo had a fallout and his daughter left the company. Mr Naidoo was provisionally sequestrated… he has now been permanently sequestrated. The ANC doesn’t owe him money… he doesn’t have locus standi to be director of any company,” said Mashita.
He e-mailed The Star a copy of his lawyers’ letter, indicating he had requested to be joined as a party in the matter.