Johannesburg - AfriForum has vowed that it will use legal funds it obtained from EFF leader Julius Malema and his party to continue their legal battle to stop the expropriation of land without
compensation.
Kallie Kriel, AfriForum chief executive, made the remarks yesterday, when he announced that the EFF and Malema have until Friday to pay his organisation R109 098 for an outstanding costs order.
“Should the money not be paid by then, AfriForum will start a process again to seize the EFF’s assets. This money pertains to the order as to costs which AfriForum obtained against the EFF and Malema on November 14, 2018, after the EFF and Malema’s attempt to obtain an urgent court order - to prevent AfriForum from removing the EFF’s property and auctioning it off - failed.
“This legal bill has since been taxed and therefore AfriForum can now enforce the payment thereof,” Kriel said. He said the costs which Afri-
Forum obtained in November were one of five orders that his organisation had obtained against Malema and the EFF to date.
He said of the cost orders, Malema and the EFF had paid two, amounting to R235 000. “With the payment of this enforceable third order, two more orders will be outstanding.
“The enforcement of last mentioned is being held back because one must still be taxed and the EFF appealed against another one.
“It’s estimated that the total of the five orders amounts to about R550 000. We will fight Malema and the EFF with their own money.”
He said the five cost orders stemmed from a court battle since March 2017, when AfriForum was granted an interdict with costs which prohibited the EFF from inciting people to illegally occupy or trespass on land.
“The North Gauteng High Court granted AfriForum’s interdict with costs. Malema and the EFF then brought an application to have the interdict set aside, which would have been heard on September 12, 2017.
“However, the court had to postpone the case after Malema and the EFF submitted their heads of argument in their own case too late.
“The judge subsequently granted a punitive cost order against Malema and the EFF.
“When the case resumed on February 18, 2018, Malema and the EFF’s legal representatives failed to appear and the case was settled in AfriForum’s favour and a further cost order issued against Malema and the EFF.”
On November 14, 2018, the other two cost orders against Malema and the EFF were issued in AfriForum’s favour in two separate cases in the North Gauteng High Court.
He said the first order applied to a case of contempt of court, brought by AfriForum against Malema and the EFF, after Malema and the EFF continued to encourage land grabs despite a standing interdict that AfriForum had obtained to prohibit them from inciting people to occupy land.