INLSA
Prince Mmelizwe Dlamini.
The advertisement for the auction of the luxury double-storey La Lucia home reads “viewing by appointment only”.
But in truth nobody can get in there, because it belongs to a would-be “king”, “Prince” Mmelizwe Dlamini, whose bodyguards have already “tossed out” an employee of a local auctioneers who tried to take photographs of the property for marketing for this Monday’s sale-in-execution.
Nedbank – which says it is owed more than R3 million by Dlamini, who failed to keep up the R30 000-a-month bond instalments he agreed to in 2006 – has handed over the Ellingham Drive property to the sheriff to be sold at an auction on the steps of the sheriff’s Verulam offices in an attempt to recover what Dlamini owes.
“It is a very saleable property, close to shops and good schools, and there has been huge interest,” said Ian Wyles, who is assisting with the auction.
“But we have had very little access. We have only a few photographs and the building plans. The buyer will have to settle the outstanding rates of R339 000 and there is no guarantee of vacant occupation,” he said.
Wyles said the property was guarded by Dlamini’s bodyguards who had literally “tossed out” his assistant Edward Nxumalo last week and forced him to delete photographs he had taken.
“The gates were open, so he drove in and started taking photographs. They made him delete the pictures and threw him out, locking his car inside. We had to get the police in to recover it,” he said.
“We were then allowed back in, by appointment, and were restricted in the number of photographs we could take and of what,” Wyles said.
Dlamini, who hails from the Ixopo/Highflats area, has been pushing to be given king status and made an unsuccessful application to the Moleleki Commission – appointed by former president Thabo Mbeki in 2003 to investigate issues raised by traditional leaders – to be put on the same footing as Zulu King Goodwill Zwelithini.
Those close to him say this cost him a lot of money.
The Mercury also reported in 2010 on a failed business venture when his Umhlanga Seeff property franchise shut and the franchise holder went to court to sever all ties with him.
A source said this had cost Dlamini between R2mn and R3m.
“He is trying to get himself back on his feet financially,” the source said.
Documents filed in the Durban High Court reflect that about a month after the Seeff debacle, Nedbank took judgment against Dlamini for R3.3m, plus interest.
The bank’s legal manager, Sijabulile Ntshangase, said she had met Dlamini on a number of occasions to discuss the arrears on his bond, and he had offered a cession of his “sugar cane sale proceeds”, which she gathered were his interests in a sugar farm near Ixopo, his traditional home.
At that time, she said, Dlamini was spending most of his time in Ixopo and was not living in the house, which the bank valued at R3.4m while Dlamini owed R3.5m.
But Dlamini reneged on all promises to pay.
And then last year the bank took Dlamini to the high court again, this time when he failed to make payments on his three vehicles, a Land Rover, an Audi A4 and a Jeep Grand Cherokee, which he bought in 2008. In that application, Ntshangase said, Dlamini’s company Insikayesizwe Financial Services had closed down and Dlamini, as surety, owed Nedbank more than R1m from that.
She said the bank had given Dlamini “various indulgences” but no payments had been made from June 2010 and the vehicles were not handed back.
Neither the sheriff nor a private investigator could locate the vehicles.
The court ordered Dlamini to stop driving the vehicles and to tell the bank where they were being kept.
Dlamini handed back the Audi and the Jeep.
Dlamini’s attorney, Rajesh Sunker, said the car issue had been resolved.
“He has paid generally and the vehicle he has, he has paid for.”
With regard to the sale of the house, Sunker said he was still negotiating with the bank with the intention of “trying to stop the sale”. – The Mercury
