Never Take Sweets from a Stranger

R2880 news you’re not supposed to know (including VAT) noseweek

87JANUARY 2007

Never take sweets from a stranger Reddam: Silence of the lambs Ugly scenes at Inanda Bowls Club Hilary Prendini Toffoli joins the club Cell C’s phone-y advertising SUBSCRIBE to noseweek and SAVE R68 on the shop price: see PAGE 19 JANUARY2007 ISSUE87 NEWS

FLASH

Cover illustration: Dr Jack 10 The Candy Man’s bitter pill noseweek He licked R20m-worth of suckers subscriptions 4 Letters n Open letter to Maria Ramos n Andrew Merryweather n Accounting software n Mbulelo Goniwe n SA Eagle n Transnet pensioners for print and 6 Dear reader Reddam: Silence of the lambs online editions 7 Transnet’s recipe for cooking the books Have actuaries become the clean-up guys hired to cover up massive thefts from pensioners? can now be 14 One bullet and no fingerprints Why do the cops find it so hard to gather evidence in cases where certain foreigners have been killed? bought 24/7 16 Harris and Goliath (Praise the Lord!) Devout Christian Michael Harris is a man with a mission – several in fact – one of which involves trying to nail FirstRand online at 18 Beware lawyers bearing contracts Could the fact that the value of a property rose by some R130m after the purchase offer was made, have anything to do with www. the sellers’ eagerness to abort the sale? 20 Ugly scenes at Inanda Bowls Club Bad language and foul tempers lead noseweek. straight to the courtroom 22 Scorpions called in over Ekurhuleni land swap Developer offered property co.za that wasn’t his in exchange for council’s prime real estate, says activist

24 Raw deal in Rawsonville? Did a bunch of farmers abuse their workers in a fruit-picking Western Cape dorp, or were they set up?

26 Little Miss Nobody gives the lawyers a run for their money 28 Bites and pieces Social commentator Hilary Prendini Toffoli goes clubbing in Cape Town and hugging in Italy

31 Phoney advertising The veil behind the sexy Cell C voice 32 Web Dreams Scatterlings of Africa 33 Law of the B®and Sneaky or stoopid? 34 Nose Ark Victory for the Kalahari Bushmen 36 Wine Hot whites 37 Last Word Barking Mammut

SUBSCRIBE to noseweek and SAVE R68 on the shop price: see PAGE 19 LawLetters

Open letter to Maria Ramos etc. My husband thought it an outfit called Channel Life. and attend top schools. Dear Ms Ramos was not necessary to take out He made the mistake of giving This was a very public as- Perhaps you have an ear heavy life insurance because them his bank account number sault. There were witnesses. A

for a SATS pensioner who has our future medical expenses over the phone. He now finds mother of one of the assailants always thought very highly of would be covered and the that they are deducting a total refused to help the badly in- your personal integrity. pension would be adequate to of R369.20 monthly from his jured Merryweather, and was My husband, Alan Mager live comfortably. Little did he account, which he claims he more concerned with getting George, joined the Railways in know. While in no way denying never authorised them to do. her son and his buddies away 1949 and was boarded 40 years the incredible benefits brought Is this company legitimate? Is from the scene. A closed-cir- later as the Assistant Chief by democracy, I do want to what they are doing legal? How “ cuit TV camera recorded her Electrical Engineer. He was remind you of this almost can he get out of it? vehicle’s number. a Fellow of the SA Institute forgotten band of SATS pen- Mike Zimmermann Apparently there was some of Electrical Engineers, and sioners. We can’t help feeling Johannesburg behind-the-scenes boasting, spent many years planning that Transnet and Transmed but when it was realised that and supervising the electrifica- are waiting – not too patiently In a serious fix the damage to the victim was tion of the Northern Cape line – for us to die. So now the government has likely to be permanent, and to Sishen. I edited a women’s I appeal to you to use some a policy of zero tolerance that legal repercussions would magazine called of the proceeds of the sale of for speeding. Yes, speed can follow, everything went mous- kill, but the majority of road ey quiet. Suddenly, nobody knew anything. No boy came forward. No parent had the decency to stand up. (They did We [pensioners] can’t help feeling that Transnet and hire a heavyweight criminal lawyer, William Booth, just in case the law came looking.) Transmed are waiting – not too patiently – for us to die Eight youths were sum- moned to an identity parade. School talk has it that they SARWoman and continued to the V&A Waterfront to grant changed their appearance for deaths occur between 7pm write a column for it even after us a pension increase. I can’t this – and, on the advice of Mr my husband’s retirement. remember when last we were and midnight in areas around shebeens. What about the re- Booth, opted for a joint line-up Think of SATS pension- given anything other than the of 40 people. Not surprisingly, ers as productive people who 2% a year. ally important issues? We have an HIV-Aids epidemic. Crime witnesses were unable to iden- were responsible for much of Mrs Lesley George tify any of them. For weeks, Transnet’s present-day infra- Cape Town is out of hand. What they have in common is drugs and more nothing happened, and the at- structure. I am now a widow tackers could prepare for and “pensioner looking back on a Is this channel legitimate? drugs. One of my employees was ap- How much crime is a result write their matric exams. long string of broken promises Suddenly, after three regarding our medical benefits, proached, telephonically, by of addicts looking for ways to pay for the next fix? How much months of inaction, and the prostitution or unprotected matric exams now over, the sex comes from drug use? suspects were subpoenaed Gus Eliminate drugs and you make to appear in court on charges a serious dent in all these prob- of attempted murder. Such a lems. We have serious drug crime should have led to the GERIATRIC HONEYMOON problems everywhere but the prompt arrest and charging of drug squad has been disband- the suspects, followed by a bail ed. At what point do we have hearing and a speedy prosecu- zero tolerance towards drug tion.Why were the wheels of dealers? The police pursue justice so conveniently halted? speeding drivers as that makes Dammit, I could accept it if a money. Do they ignore the drug magistrate granted bail and dealers for the same reason? postponement for the accused Totally Fed Up to write matric. But to pretend Blaauberg that an investigation is going nowhere for three months is Serious money magic totally unacceptable. Last year, noseweek carried And since when were people the story of how some St subpoenaed instead of ar- John’s boys, sons of wealthy rested for violent crimes? The and influential parents, evad- said lawyer denies that his ed being charged in a serious clients got special treatment, assault case. and implies that the delay This time the victim is a was purely because the police young man from Cape Town, needed time to complete their Andrew Merryweather, who investigation, and the pros- was violently assaulted by a ecutor needed time to decide group of teenage youths last whether or not to prosecute. September. He faces spend- Well, I suppose we have to ing the rest of his life in a accept his word – just as he wheelchair. Alas the youths can’t prove there aren’t fairies involved also have wealthy at the bottom of my garden. parents – they are from the Ron McGregor We’re off to Viagra Falls! well-heeled Southern Suburbs, Mowbray

4 noseweek January 2007 Drivel

PRESS RELEASE Not soft on support less than three years, Omni Two letters to noseweek regard- Accounts is set to capture the Ali G ing accounting software dem- local accounting software mar- (With apologies to Bob Dylan) onstrate the need to ask key ket over the next few years. (It questions before purchasing a has been around for more than software product. 20 years.) I am liberal (to a degree) With the rapid development Ivor van Rensburg So did not laugh at Ali G of business technologies it’s IT Public Relations vital that companies have the and will not laugh, I’d like it known, Not horsing around capacity to keep up, and as at other stuff by Sasha Cohen smaller organisations don’t The Taxpayers Collective wish have the necessary in-house to announce that we intend skills, software suppliers are demanding five horses from unless, of course, if he lampoons creating support structures, that Goniwe chap who once President Bush’s rightwing goons. usually in the form of call was ANC chief whip, for having centres that users access for an used public servants, i.e. ad- Gus Ferguson affordable annual fee. Also for ministrative assistants, to clean the sake of affordability, the up his personal birthday mess. costs of support and upgrades (The going rate is three, but she are being annualised. was called out on overtime.) It is important to realise that We don’t want cows; we buy Zyl from Sovereign Assessors behaviour! accounting software is the in- our milk from supermarkets. to investigate the claim. He in Only in the second week of formation systems’ backbone to Borat, the Kazakhstan reporter turn appointed a Mr J Fourie September did someone at SA any business. Customers need invited to report on the trial, from Lojan Veracity Assessors, Eagle come to their senses, as support immediately and this will understand: in our 19th who interrogated my son to no I was telephoned and told that is primarily why our Cover pro- century mining economy with end. Then Mr Naude, manager the claim would be paid. gram was been devised, which its lack of public transport and of the forensic team, got my It is my understanding that allows Softline Pastel to provide properly maintained roads, file. Despite several calls to the general rule of insurance extensive expertise on a range horses are more useful. And him to enquire why there was is utmost good faith. Without of issues relating to accounting one can eat them if, say, a a delay in settlement of the doubt, this is something that principles and policies, operat- tribal war breaks out. claim, I got no answer. I was the forensic personnel of SA ing systems, and networks. We Mr T eventually telephoned by his Eagle should come to grips now have in excess of 30,000 Fontainebleau assistant, Mr Wynand Lowe, with, sooner than later. customers on Pastel Cover, the who told me that the claim Mrs WM Steyn number having doubled in the The eagle hasn’t landed was still under investigation. Johannesburg past three years. This bears After reading your earlier ac- Weeks later Lowe called again to say that Naude wanted my Great train robbery testimony to the value we offer counts of dirty dealings in the As a long-serving Transnet son to come to SA Eagle to our customers. claims department of SA Eagle, employee I was often told: make a proper statement since We are confident that the a friend suggested that I write “Your salary might not be good, they were not happy with the Pastel Accounting software to you as I too have had a most but when you retire you will re- information in their possession. range will continue to form the unpleasant ordeal with the in- ceive a good pension and have I was at a complete loss to foundation of South African surer’s forensic team. SA Eagle a good sick fund for your old understand Mr Naude’s line business. clients should be made aware age” - a lie on both counts. of reasoning and decided to Lara Nahon of what they are up against While Maria Ramos makes telephone a Mr D Naidoo, the Director – Business Development, when they have claims. hay in the sunshine and basks claims manager at SA Eagle, Softline Pastel On the evening of 14 June in the media limelight, I’d like for help. I believe no such per- 2006, while at a filling station to remind her of the forgotten in Vereeniging, my son was son exists: he was never available to take any calls, let alone army who gave their best and Local is lekker the victim of a hijacking. As he now find they are an embarras- In a recent article and letters phone back when messages opened the car door, two men ment to Transnet and the about accounting software, fa- were left asking him to do so. climbed in and ordered him government. We were robbed vourable reference was made to A friend made some enquir- to drive off. A while later they in our working years - and Omni Accounts. Against all the ies; it is apparent that the two ordered him to stop and get are being stolen from in our odds, locally developed Omni gentlemen, newly appointed out, then drove off, never to be twilight years. Accounts is a well respected at the forensic department seen again. Mr Nose, give them hell! and affordable package that is of SA Eagle, were previously I submitted a claim via my D A Burnett steadily gaining market share. employed by the SAPS. Maybe insurance broker to SA Eagle. Midrand With more than 9000 sales in this explains their unusual My brokers appointed Ben van See story on page 7.

noseweek January 2007 5 Law Dear Reader

Editor Martin Welz Production editor Reddam: Silence Tony Pinchuck Assistant editor Hans Muhlberg of the lambs Gauteng bureau Jack Lundin It is necessary only for good men Censor-in-chief to do nothing for evil to triumph Len Ashton Sub-editor dmund Burke’s wisdom seems to have Chas Unwin passed the staff, pupils and parents of Reddam House, Cape Town’s private Cartoons school for the nouveau riche, entirely Gus Ferguson by. But then should more be expected of Myke Ashley-Cooper Ethem than of St John’s College, Gauteng’s school Contributors for Old Money, under similar circumstances? Melany Bendix In September a group of mostly Reddam mat- Ed Herbst ric pupils, at least some of them intoxicated after Tim James a night of “clubbing” on Claremont Main Road, Marike Roth were involved in a pavement assault which left a Hilary Prendini Toffoli young man crippled for life. Andreas Stelzer Reddam School was quickly ordered to be tight- Harold Strachan lipped about the affair. No-one was called in. No- Andrew Merryweather and supporter at the first Mark Thomas one was asked to own up and apologise. Certainly court appearance of the Reddam accused Hilary Venables no-one was to talk to the Press. What might have Adam Welz happened off school property, involving pupils out of uniform, is not the school’s business, was the est effort to attend to the injured young man. Research consultant official line. It may be an expedient and profitable Momentarily stuck behind another car, Nicholas Deon Basson line, but it certainly isn’t a moral one. wrote down her registration number. “Don’t Subscriptions Within 24 hours of the assault, the entire bother,” she sneered, “I’m used to dealing with Maud Petersen school knew what had happened and who were these situations.” (Whatever that might mean.) Advertising involved. The group had included Reddam For the next four hours, while Andrew lay in Adrienne de Jongh “jocks” Michael Enslin, captain of the rugby first intensive care at Groote Schuur hospital with a team and member of the hockey and cricket fractured neck, a man who identified himself as Accounts first teams, Liam Hechter, first team rugby and “Pierre” repeatedly called Sister Thorne in charge Nicci Joubert-van Doesburgh cricket, Oliver Scholtz, also first team rugby of the unit, enquiring whether Andrew “was still and cricket, and Dane Killian, under-17 first alive”. “I didn’t bring up my children to behave Subscription rates team cricket. At around 3am they had encoun- like this,” he declared to Sister Thorne, who Print: SA only R260 for 12 issues. tered two young men in a Kwikspar on Main passed on the name and number to Mrs Merry- Neighbouring states (airmail) Road: Andrew Merryweather, 25, and his friend weather. R375; Overseas (airmail) Europe, and fellow employee at the Theatre on the “I didn’t call him as I didn’t feel up to calling Americas and Australasia: R400 Bay, Progress Mphande. It seems to have been the father of one of the thugs to help him to (for 12 issues). Online: R265 for 12 Andrew’s boyish looks (the result of a lifetime feel better,” she said. So noseweek phoned him. issues (visit www.noseweek.co.za). on cortisone) that prompted the Reddam boys’ Hullo, is that Pierre? Yes. What’s your surname? insults: “Look at the poofters!” exclaimed one. Why do you want to know? he asks. So we tell To subscribe by post When this elicited no response, it was repeated, him. Pause. “I can’t talk to you. I can’t talk to Send cheque with name, address louder. “That’s not acceptable,” Progress recalls Mrs Merryweather either,” he says, ringing off. and phone no. to: noseweek, PO Andrew saying, “I’m going to tell them to apolo- Another Reddam parent who has decided that Box 44538, Claremont 7735. gise.” Which he proceeded politely to do – only to silence is the easier option. get struck down for his trouble. And then to be We phone the Redddam matric class teacher, To subscribe via Internet and pay by kicked by the whole group for two metres along James Buchanan, to ask if we’ve got Ollie Scholtz’s credit card www.noseweek.co.za the garage forecourt outside the shop, until he name correct and what Shane’s surname is. “We For further information lay bleeding and unconscious. have been asked not to say anything,” he confirms. call (021) 686 0570 or email Andrew’s brother Nicholas had arrived as the “I know nothing and I don’t pry,” he says, when [email protected] assault commenced. His attempts to dissuade asked if it was not his responsibility as grade the mob from further assaulting his brother teacher to have discussed the issue with his class Copyright All material in this issue is went unheeded. According to the garage person- and provide moral guidance. copyright, and belongs to Chaucer Publications (Pty) Ltd, unless otherwise nel on duty at the time, the assault took place di- A little later he admits: “We have been told indicated. No part of the material may be rectly in front of the Chrysler Voyager that had what they know?” “Who are they?” “The head- quoted, photocopied, reproduced or be arrived to collect the Reddam boys. Mrs Steph- master – a normal staff meeting thing.” Then he stored by any electronic system without anie Killian sat in the driver’s seat throughout, adds: “Things happen in an institution that are prior written permission. Disclaimer While every reasonable effort is taken to ensure until the boys, including her red-headed son, not your business.” the accuracy and soundness of the contents Dane, piled into the car shouting “Go! Go! Go!”, We’ll see about that. of this publication, neither the authors nor and she roared away without making the slight- The Editor the publisher will bear any responsibility for the consequences of any actions based on information contained. Printed and Published by Chaucer Publications6 (Pty) Ltd. noseweek January 2007

Corporate housekeeping Transnet’s recipe for cooking the books Have actuaries, those worthy gentlemen, become the clean-up guys hired by big corporations to cover up massive thefts from their pensioners?

AY BACK IN JANUARY 2000 an countersigned Wellsted’s report, which Picture: independent actuarial as- was completed in January 2000.

sessment of the Transnet The report concluded that: “It is clear IMAGES24.co.za/Volksblad/ Charlé Lombard Pension Fund made it clear from the March 1999 valuation report that Transnet had succeeded (by the actuary of the Transnet Pension Win co-opting the fund’s trustees and its Funds) that it is highly unlikely that professional actuaries into “cooking the sufficient funds have been reserved to books”, effectively defrauding its pension- fund prudently the promised benefits of ers of billions of rands they were entitled the fund.” to expect in pensions over the period of Most notably, Wellsted found that their retirement. the Fund’s trustees and their actuary By devious means, Transnet had suc- had deliberately (and without justifi- ceeded in ridding itself of liability for an cation) chosen to place considerable R11.8-billion pension deficit. reliance on inflation eroding the Fund Last month we reported how Maria and Transnet’s pension obligations as a Ramos earned a R3m bonus for up- “funding mechanism”. ping Transnet’s profits by shafting the This bit of hocus-pocus alone had Reasons to be cheerful: Transnet CEO Maria company’s pensioners. It emerges that resulted in reducing the assets required Ramos gives a big hand to the actuaries in 1999 Johannesburg pension fund by the fund (and, therefore, Transnet’s consultant Roger Wellsted was asked by liability) by more than R5 billion. one of the Transnet unions to investigate In short, if you assume a high rate of generate the income needed to pay pen- the Transnet Pension Fund. Registered income based on a high inflation rate, sions. actuary Peter Theunissen approved and you need a smaller amount of capital to Wellsted also noted that their valuation of assets “appeared to be” in direct conflict with South African actuarial guidelines. “Assets of the fund have been valued higher than prudent actuarial practice. This has resulted in a significant reduction in the overall value reserved for members and pensioners,” he told the trustees. What Wellsted’s report shows is that the trustees and actuary had also doc- tored the expenditure side of the books. He noted: “The salary increase assumptions appear low” and “The average age assumptions have not taken into account the ageing of members over the past valuation period.” The Fund’s trustees (on instructions from Transnet) had instructed the actuary to make provision for 5% per annum increases to pensions (only 2% for new pensioners for the first three years). This was based on Transnet’s view that inflation would be about 5% per annum

noseweek January 2007 7 Law Corporate housekeeping

over the next few years. pensions would fall some 25% behind But, while restricting pension in- inflation within the first five years. Business in the creases to 2% and 5% per annum, the This has happened. actuary used an assumed inflation rate He calculated further that, if a mem- Western Cape? of 9% for calculating returns on the ber retires at 55 and lives to 80, his fund’s investments. By using two dif- pension will likely become worthless Looking to buy or sell? fering inflation assumptions, some R5.1 over this period of time, based on the Any size, any industry. billion was released from the fund – ar- Transnet trustees’ current valuation tificially reducing the fund’s shortfall. methods. KLC Business Consultants Wellsted notes: “The responsibility for So much for Transnet’s promise to its Tel 021 872 8800 this difference in the assessment of the employees of a “defined benefit” for the Fax 021 872 8815 inflation rate lies with trustees of the period of their service. Fund. This is on the assumption that the Statistics show that pension funds’ or email [email protected] actuary made it clear to the trustees that investments generally perform at about he did not agree with their view of the 3.5% to 4.5% above inflation. This is projected inflation rate.” known as the “Real Rate of Return”. The result for pensioners: “The effect In the case of Transnet, the trustees of the change in valuation basis will and their actuary were, without any decrease the real value of pensions by justification, assuming their invest- some R3,8 billion. It must be noted that ments would perform at 7% and even based on the 9% inflation rate used by 9% above the inflation rate. Here the actuary to assess return on assets, Wellsted notes: “It is doubtful that the it is unlikely that the Fund will be able Financial Services Board would accept to provide for a 5% annual increase to a 9% post-retirement interest rate as pensions; particularly so over the long- an acceptable actuarial assumption. term.” The previous post-retirement interest There is a legal obligation in terms rate used was 4.5%.” of “reasonable benefit expectation” to Wellsted was also critical of how the For all your property finance requirements increase pensions, subject to certain pension funds’ actuary had over-opti- conditions, he said. mistically valued the funds’ holdings of “If a Pension Fund can afford to listed shares and government stocks, Gary Peterson Jenni Warrington increase pensions in line with inflation, and states that these valuations do not 082 453 7374 083 280 2444 based on investment performance of comply with good actuarial practice. [email protected] [email protected] the assets set aside to fund pensions, He is similarly critical of the actu- then it is reasonable to expect pensions ary’s assumptions about expected sal- www.bondman.co.za to be increased accordingly. ary increases (he assumed they would “The pensioners would not expect the consistently be below the inflation rate) Fund to withhold increases, causing and the average age of employees. pensions to fall behind the inflation By all these means, Wellsted calcu- Steve Banhegyi & Associates rate in order for the Fund to make a lated that the trustees had succeeded profit/surplus on the pensioner portion in removing a real shortfall of R11.4 www.trans4mation.co.za of the assets,” he noted pointedly. That billion from the pension fund’s – and, 083 232 6047 is, of course, exactly what Transnet indirectly, Transnet’s – books. Consulting in leadership, organisational change and the fund trustees were proposing He concludes his report with a to do. reminder: “The actuary and trustees of management, knowledge management, Wellsted said it was reasonable for the fund have a fiduciary responsibility educational media development, and storytelling pensioners to expect that sufficient funds to ensure that, to the best of their abil- had been set aside to fund the defined or ity, the promised pensions are reason- promised benefit set out in the rules of ably funded.” their Fund. They would not expect the n In August 2003 Mr D A Burnett, I can’t find your cool funding of their pensions to be based on a Transnet pensioner resident in I can’t find your golf game the devaluing purchasing power of these Midrand, wrote to the chairman of pensions. (Were the latter the case, in the Transnet Second Defined Pension Nor can I find your car a zero-based inflation economy, there Fund, Mr Ian Smith, to express his But I CAN find your water leaks would be insufficient funds to retain the concern at the way the fund was being payment of pensions.) mismanaged. “What a cosy situation Using the latest technology It was clear from the fund actuary’s we have with Transnet appointing its with no guess work. statement that it was unlikely that own people to run the pension fund. Greater Johannesburg sufficient funds had been set aside, I am aghast at the cronyism between said Wellsted. In order for the Fund to the appointed trustees and Transnet stay financially sound, pensions would management. They should be exposed (011) 763 6306 have to be decreased, or additional and held financially responsible for the funding would have to be injected into debacle.” Geldenhuis the Fund. His letter, which concluded with Wellsted predicted that, based on a demand for an explanation for the Plumbing the pension fund actuary’s own as- fund’s shoddy performance, has re- sumptions, the effect would be that mained unanswered to this day.

8 noseweek January 2007 Last year’s monthly average sale of noseweek was up 47% on 2003: Circulation 17 402 (ABC Jul-Sep 2006); Readership 43 505 Readership Profile: 88% are in LSMs 9 and 10; 39% are business owners; 27% are company directors While 80% of purchasers are male, spouse readership is a whopping 56%. noseweek is consistently among the Top 10 magazines sold at the Exclusive Books chain. For more information contact Adrienne: (021) 686 0570 or [email protected]; www.noseweek.co.za

noseweek January 2007 9 Poor suckers

Sweet sorrow

Mature Gauteng citizens will recall the exotic delights of Dick’s candy shop, for years the cave of delights for children visiting Joburg’s Eloff Street. But nostalgia is turning sour in an elaborate scam involving millions

XCITED BY AN AD in Your Business promising a monthly income of between R4000 and R6000, Ethel van Zyl called the advertised number and found herself Etalking to Mr Pieter van der Watt. Van der Watt, of ARDT200 Trading cc, trading as Kandyland, a sweets manufacturer based in Cape Town, offered Van Zyl exclusive “depot” rights for trading Kandyland products in the Bloemfontein area. Daily sales from a depot supplying local shops and cafes, she was told, were worth at least R1200. Quickly calculating that she could recover the licence fee of R60,000 in a few months, Mrs van Zyl handed her life savings over to KandyLand. In an affidavit detailing her disastrous dealings with Van der Watt, she reports that she was enticed further down the path by Like taking candy: Pieter van der Watt and a marketing pamphlet which claimed: his product “Our most successful reps collect between R3000 and R6000 worth of or any other major retail stores in the In October 2005 Kerry van Schalkwyk orders per day”. area. To add to her woes, deliveries of Durban responded to a KandyLand After Van Zyl deposited her R60,000, of products from Cape Town were at ad for a depot licence and she, too, Van der Watt prepared her for what times delayed, or not made at all. She was promised the sole rights to supply she took to be exclusive training – but began to slip behind on her required ranges of “unique” candies, sweets, tof- on fetching him from the Bloemfontein weekly sales of R2500, leading to seri- fees and biltong to Pick ’n Pay, Spar, airport one fine day in June 2005, she ous cash-flow problems that eventually Engen, Friendly Grocer, Woolworths discovered a bunch of other distribu- forced her to default on the terms of and Clicks – outlets she was assured tors waiting there for the same train- the contract. were listed KandyLand clients and ing. Van der Watt coolly explained Her attempts to reclaim the R60,000 awaiting restocking for that Christ- that these were “sub-licensees” – the have been hindered by the fact that mas. area promised to her, she discovered, KandyLand never issued her with tax Kerry was promised a turnover of had been sub-divided into smaller invoices. The only evidence she has between R30,000 and R100,000 within distribution areas. of her dealings with Kandyland are the first three months, but earned only She also learned soon enough that a bank deposit slip and a copy of the a paltry R1,260 in that period. She, KandyLand products were not, as contract. too, discovered that there were no pre- promised in Van der Watt’s promotion- Van Zyl, it turns out, is one of existing agreements with the “listed” al materials, listed with Pick ’n Pay, hundreds of unhappy complainants. stores. She too was never issued tax

10 noseweek January 2007 invoices by KandyLand. Kerry lost close corporation with the registra- nearly R120,000. Her payments to tion number CK 2000/073229091. In KandyLand went into the same bank fact no corporation with that number account as those made by every other exists. The existing “The Candy Fac- hapless individual lured by the mirage KandyLand’s list tory Franchise” Registration number of sweet promises. 2000/070102/23 came into being on KandyLand’s list of now penniless of now penniless November 21, 2000 – not more than a investors reads like a mini national century ago as suggested by his promo- telephone directory. No area seemed tional materials. too far away from Van der Watt and no investors reads like Edmond Hayes of Durban and Leon name was deemed beyond pronuncia- Fourie of Johannesburg were among tion. KandyLand has reached into just a phone directory. those who bought factory franchises about every corner of the country. Abe, for R450,000 a shot. They handed over Adrian, Anne-Marie, Bongani, Carl, their cash on receiving Van der Watt’s Charlaet, Collins, Daniel, Daphne, No area seemed assurance that not only would Kandy- Daryl, Denzil, Don, Ed, Elena, Elsabe, Land’s licensed distributors buy the Errol – all the way to Tony, Vic, sweets, but that the Cape Town office Wessel, Willie, Wilma and Xolani. too far away from would too. Cape Town Detective Trevor Bailey Hayes and Fourie both discovered, says an investigation has been opened Van der Watt and when their factories were up and run- by the SAPS crime branch involving ning, that most licensed distributors more than 340 dissatisfied licensees. in their areas were already trying to So far noseweek has been able to con- no name was pull out of their contracts with Kandy- firm 85 dissatisfied investors, most of Land. Van der Watt himself gave whom have made sworn statements, deemed beyond excuse after excuse for not collecting and is presently checking on 115 more sweets from their factories, and both who have each lost between R60,000 were stuck with mounting stocks they and R450,000. pronunciation couldn’t sell. Hayes is still struggling In his promotional materials, and to pay back an ABSA loan which paid on his website, Van der Watt promises for the franchise. He has been black- a monthly income of between R4,000 listed and can no longer open a bank and R16,000 for each franchise licence, products. But a senior marketing account. but highlights that “a good representa- manager at Spar headquarters in Cape If just the 340 licensees each paid tive will bring in more than R12,000 Town confirmed to noseweek that they R60,000 into KandyLand’s bank worth of sales per month.” What is not buy candies directly from KandyLand account, Van der Watt has received explained is that the agents only enjoy and never from agents. over R20m from his “depot” victims. a 20% commission on cash sales and It’s not only “ depot” licences that are Nearly all licensees were not issued 15% on invoice sales. This works out for sale. The price of a factory licence with any tax invoices despite be- to a mere R1,440 per month. He then is R450,000 and the advertisement ing told the amounts they paid into deducts VAT, leaving the agents with brochure screams: “After 137 years of KandyLand’s Standard Bank account just over R1000. guarding our secret recipes, you can number 270808779 were inclusive of His misrepresentations don’t end now own the rights to manufacture one VAT. (The bank might want to check: there; when his agents aren’t doing as of our exclusive sweets lines…” Yet at least two of the names listed as well as expected, Van der Watt entices ARDT200 Trading cc was registered members of the close corporation have them to buy more licences for other on January 25 1999 with a standard false ID numbers.) areas to cover their shortfall, deepen- industrial classification: “Whole- ing the vicious cycle. sale and Retail Trade; Repair of A common experience reflected in Motor Vehicles, Motor Cycles the affidavits is that an agent suddenly and Personal and Household finds supplies not coming through from Goods; Hotels and Restaurants.” Cape Town, at first gets no response to There is no mention anywhere enquiries, and is then given promises of sweets manufacturing. that the problem will be solved. And The recipes that Van der Watt waits, and waits... A few months down in his promotional materials the line, the agent discovers that the claims are his, don’t belong to area to which exclusive rights have him. The original Dick’s Sweets been given has been sold to another recipes today belong to another agent. They learn at that point that sweet maker. they have lost exclusive rights because Van der Watt sells fac- they haven’t met their contractual tory franchises under the obligations to move specific amounts of name “The Candy Factory stock, and are in breach of contract. Franchising”, purportedly a And Van der Watt would himself also still sell directly to stores in the exclusive rights holders’ territories. Sugar-coated: Van der Watt’s flyer, For instance, he lists Spar as one of used to entice hapless would-be the major outlets that buy KandyLand entrepreneurs

noseweek January 2007 11 LawPoor suckers

Has SARS, one wonders, recovered More than a year letters as well as letters of demand.” the VAT due on the tens of millions of He adds: “We have enough proof to rands taken in by Van der Watt? proceed against any party that dis- Pieter van der Watt declined to be ago, the Receiver credits our firm. We supply jobs to over interviewed, preferring to respond 40 homes and these people depend on to noseweek’s queries by email. He the business to make a living. Discred- writes: “Due to non-performance and was provided iting the company can and will harm in several cases licence holders selling the name and will damage our reputa- with several tion.” He naturally doesn’t mention the 340-plus homes that have lost their investments in his licences. Everyone boxes of invoices is a pawn in his grand dream of being a Millionaire Broker. implicating Van It’s not clear why SARS has not acted against Van der Watt. A con- fidential source tells noseweek that, der Watt in tax more than a year ago, the Receiver was provided with several boxes of invoices implicating Van der Watt in crimes tax crimes. An NPA official in Cape Town was also given files detailing various al- the stock and not banking as per the leged frauds, yet, years down the line, agreement we are forced to send them no charges have been filed. Pieter van warning letters. Should they still not der Watt remains at large, to continue respond we will send them termination luring more franchisees.

12 noseweek January 2007 The baby-faced

Candy Man Cape Town and suburbs tel 0861 422 426 fax 021 419 7484 email [email protected] EET PIETER JACOBUS van der Watt, a national-scale fraudster who once claimed he’d been a top anti-fraud detective with the SA Police. MHe hadn’t. Van der Watt disclosed the scale of his ambitions in 1990, by registering a close corporation called ”Millionaire Brokers”. In 1995 he registered Stamsa Distributors and Stamsa Manufacturers, and, with no docu- mented knowledge of clothing design, advertised and sold “designer clothes”, and franchises for them. In June 1999 the Sunday Times car- Beaten: Pieter van der Watt and Maresa ried an exposé: dozens of disgruntled Engelbrecht at their wedding in 2002. The franchisees had been sent “inferior, marriage lasted four months bottom-of-the-range, old fashioned garments” instead of Stamsa’s exclusive Tibaldi range. Under pressure Van der ing an income of between R4,000 and Watt explained that their job was not to R16,000 a month. sell his garments, but to sub-franchise Van der Watt seems to have done his brand. Said Van der Watt: “I am business worth anything between selling a concept. It’s the same as Tup- R50m and R100m since 2000. We can perware.” Not quite. He claimed that only speculate where those millions his own designs were too expensive for are: he has a web of close corpora- direct marketing: the agents had paid tions at his disposal, registered under to distribute “a wide range” of clothes. different ID numbers, some operating Crying innocence, he accused the media without formal registration. of interfering with his source of income. Even in his personal life the Van der Watt then approached an kandyman is no sweetie. Several women established Cape Town sweets manu- have been left with bruised bodies facturer, Traditional Cape Candies and emotional damage. Their families (TCC) cc, offering to buy a retiring and friends allegedly threatened, they member’s share and claiming to have have been forced into silence. One at his disposal a vast distribution net- told noseweek, “I have decided to not work. There wasn’t one; he had picked comment at this stage. I can only let TCC, trading as Kandy Man, to aid his you know that I have endured extreme business reincarnation. Van der Watt physical and emotional abuse from began placing huge orders for sweets, him”. Contacted for comment Van der which he hoarded at a warehouse. TCC Watt replies: “I do not abuse people. I were impressed but reluctant to take am a single parent who has brought him in as a member. A former TCC up my son and daughter for the past employee told noseweek that Van der 17 years. They are always with me Watt began using the TCC’s VAT reg- and if any such things were happening istration number to beat the taxman. they would know about it.” Why then, She passed this information to one of did he write and sign, at Durbanville the partners, who smelled a rat and Police Station in the Western Cape, opted out of the business he had helped an undertaking to seek professional found. Fearing involvement in fraudu- help to curb his violent tendencies? lent activities, the remaining partners Some licensees have also narrated to decided to liquidate TCC. With a noseweek how easily he becomes violent slightly changed name – now Van der when confronted. Walt – and using a “rearranged” ID n Interested parties will find a list number, he began trading as Kandy- of Van der Watt’s corporations on the Land, using his hoarded candies. noseweek website (www.noseweek. Hundreds responded to his ads promis- co.za).

noseweek January 2007 13 Somali murders

ETECTIVE INSPECTOR JANSEN of Mbek- weni CID has difficulty explain- ing how and why Siyabulela Ngcine, 22, and his two col- leagues, were released shortly Dafter being arrested for the murder of Somali businessman Isaack Ibrahim Isaack, 27. In quick self-defence Jansen adds: “I was on leave and the file was just handed to me when I returned. I don’t know who was responsible.” So who handled the file before him? Picture: No answer – police seem to find the question irrelevant. Says the Comman- Andrew Ingram/Cape Times dant of the station, Captain S. Breden- han dismissively: “They had to be released because there was not enough evidence.” No, Captain, there wasn’t any evidence at all – noseweek can reveal that no trace evidence was collected from the scene of the attack. The file contains only one bullet – two were fired, and no fingerprints were dusted for. Angry: Somali traders protesting at Ocean View police station in Cape Town Mbekweni residents are unhappy with how the SAPS handled the case. “We provided the police with informa- “ tion that led to their arrests, only to see the suspects back in the township,” claims a 25-year old man who talked to noseweek on condition of anonymity. One bullet and Eighteen days after Ngcine was released, he attempted to rob a local resident at gunpoint. The community took the law into their own hands and no fingerprints administered mob justice after disarm- ing him. The police rescued the suspect from the mob – residents claim that Why do the police find it so difficult to gather evidence police respond faster when a criminal is being punished than when criminals are attacking. in cases where certain foreigners have been killed? The residents who handed the firearm to the rescuing officers believe it’s the same gun that was used in the along Mpumelo Road in Mbekweni. bia as the core motive in the attacks, shootings of Somalis. “Those are just While Farah is lucky to be alive after it’s the locals who identified the three allegations,” states Capt. Bredenhan: undergoing treatment at Paarl Hospi- suspects in Isaack’s murder who are “We can only be sure once the forensic tal, the locals are questioning why the now fearing for their lives. results are in and that will take at least SAPS didn’t intensify patrols in the According to a copy of an autopsy re- three months.” With the heavy backlogs township after the Farah attack. “Police port in the possession of noseweek, Dr. at the Forensic Laboratories Services, it laxity is making us locals, and Deidre Kay Abrahams, the could well take longer than that. the country look bad,” stated senior forensic pathologist The firearm taken from Ngcine was another area resident. “We who performed the post-mor- licensed, but the registered owner has love Somali traders. They sell tem, observes that Isaack’s not been charged for allowing his fire- their products cheaper than “clothing should be retained arm to be used in a crime. everybody else here and they for ballistic examinations”. Isaack died in Paarl hospital 18 hours have brought the essential Whether this was done will after being shot in his shop in Them- goods to us, so we also save on emerge only when the foren- bani Square, Mbekweni. On October taxi fares to the city. sic report arrives – and no 9, at about 1.45pm, three gunmen had “They may be foreigners, one knows when this will be. entered the shop and fired two shots, but they would never turn If the 4 January 2004 murder fleeing the scene without taking any- you away if you want food of Aden Siyat Abdi at Delft thing. The Somali was hit in the chest and don’t have enough money has not been resolved to date, and hand. – they tell you to make sure then the August and later Three days prior to the fatal shooting you bring money tomorrow,” murders may take much of Isaack, the same gunmen are alleged said an elderly woman. longer. to have shot, in the groin, another shop Ironically, while media re- Murdered: Isaack In the meantime the case Ibrahim Isaack owner, Abdelnasir Farah, in his shop ports often allude to xenopho- joins the pile of incompletely

14 noseweek January 2007

investigated “incidents”, and an answer die that night.” Sofia and her children to what actually motivated this and were given less than a day to leave the

other attacks seems more remote by the house. week. Yusuf had a licensed firearm, but the Isaack is just one of the many whose killer(s) gave him no chance to use it. INCLUDE cause of death is vanishing behind They stole the gun, which noseweek has a wall of confusion. In Delft, Yusuf learnt, was recovered in Port Elizabeth Baharabdullah was shot and killed on days later. “ noseweek September 19, leaving behind a wife, Away from Mbekweni and Delft, Sofia Abdillahi Hajji, and five children. noseweek talked with Abdulahi Moham- in your conference goody bag Sofia, the Internet face of what So- ed Hajji, the proprietor of Discount Su- [email protected] malia-operated sites refer to as “South permarket in Strand. “We haven’t had Africa’s Somali widows”, was further xenophobic or business-competition-mo- It’s the attackers who fired at us. We were all told to lie down. But now I’m being accused for shooting one of them, yet I have never carried a gun in my life – Solwazi Vuthela, security guard employed by a Somali shopkeeper

tivated attacks here,” he said, “but we have robberies. My shop has been attacked twice “ and the police do nothing.” Hajji talks of numerous times he has sought protection from the police, only to be told that his fears were misplaced. When the supermarket was attacked, police arrested Solwazi Vuthela, Hajji’s security guard, instead of suspects who had been Bloody hands: Cartoon by Amin, based in Somalia. The identified. Vuthela’s crime, bubble in Somali reads: ‘You do this because we don’t according to the police, was Back Pain? have a government, but some day the position may be assault on the gang that had Get relief from pain and learn reversed.’ tried to rob his employer’s how to avoid it supermarket. Vuthela, now out on bail, British-qualified shocked when police detectives at Delft tells noseweek that he didn’t even have practitioner of circulated information implicating a weapon. “It’s the attackers who fired tPilates t another Somali businessman in her at us. We were all told to lie down. But Therapeutic Massage t Feldenkrais Method ® husband’s murder. noseweek learned now I’m being accused of shooting one of gentle exercise from local community leaders that po- of them, yet I have never carried a gun lice claimed to have inside information in my life.” Barbara McCrea that the murder was linked to conflict Calm seems to have returned to (021) 788 9626 or 083 745 7086 between Somali businessmen. most affected areas, but many Somali Classes and individual sessions – phone to find out Through a translator, Sofia told businesspeople are still afraid to return about Cape Town and Joburg dates noseweek that she believes the claims to their former places of business. In were meant to hide the truth. She August alone at least six Somali busi- wonders what their landlady, a police- nessmen were murdered. Awil Barre, woman, was doing near their home the Sugon Salah, Siyad Shukri Maalim night Yusuf was murdered. “She hardly and Abdirahman Awil were killed in A space this size is a snip at comes to the premises, but that night Khayelitsha; Gulet Abdi Nur was killed she appeared before everybody else.” in Kuilsriver, while Ahmed Sare Ogas O N LY The landlady/policewoman, she says, was reportedly killed in Beacon Valley, later claimed that Yusuf owed her Mitchells Plain. R1,000 in unpaid rent. The figure was The Western Cape police headquar- later increased to R2,000 and then to ters is reluctant to respond to claims of R750... R3,000. The landlady threatened to laxity within the force in the handling confiscate their property unless the of the Somali cases. Capt. Billy Jones, Why not try it for size? amount was paid in full. “We always after asking for our list of questions, [email protected] paid our rents well in advance. It’s has decided not to respond to them com- like she knew that Yusuf was going to prehensively.

noseweek January 2007 15 Bank you, and good night Harris and Goliath (Praise the Lord!)

T WAS BUSINESS as usual at FirstRand Limited’s AGM on 23 November – golden boys GT “Getuned” Ferreira and Laurie ‘Bad and Illegal Business Dippenaar turning on bad boy IHarris and chucking him out of the Practices – Crime and Lies meeting. But relax – you’ve not missed out at FirstRand’ is what devout on the biggest piece of corporate gossip of the year, because we’re not talking about fellow superstar and Christian Michael Harris company CEO Paul Harris. Being thrown out on his ear, again, was (left) writes on virtually born-again Christian Michael Har- ris, owner of a measly 100 shares in each leaf of his 1000-page FirstRand Limited, and a man prone to stirring the pot. He’d just objected dossier of complaints to the re-election of Dippenaar on the basis that Dippenaar was crimi- against the banking giant nally concealing a fraud. Earlier in the meeting Dippenaar had informed those present that the company was going to “expunge” Harris – a reference concerned – he could survive the crisis register further bonds over his proper- to Harris’ ongoing campaign to have if the bank extended his credit, and he ties, Mazlen would be liquidated. certain “falsities” expunged from com- approached McInnes for assistance. Help Harris refused to mortgage his pany records. was forthcoming, but Harris would have properties further but the whole situa- The story goes back some 45 years, to provide the bank with power of at- tion became untenable. In a last-ditch when the young Michael Harris began torney in order to register a second bond attempt to avoid liquidation Harris banking at Barclays Bank (now FNB) in over a property which Harris owned in arranged for the sale at auction of a Rosebank, Johannesburg. Harris had a Buccleuch, registered in the name of his number of properties, the proceeds of good relationship with the branch man- ex-wife, Hazel. Once power of attorney which would allow him to clear his debt ager, Brian McInnes, who made avail- had been signed, the bank would provide and give him the funds to establish a able an “umbrella” overdraft facility, overdraft facilities up to 60% of the Christian kibbutz. The banks which which was raised or lowered as required value of the Buccleuch property. Harris held bonds over the properties agreed to Harris’s company Mazlen Holdings, thought the property was worth around to the sale – all except First National. whose main game was property devel- R500,000 and was expecting an overdraft Attorney McEwan went as far as opment. The company did rather well in the order of R300,000. stopping the sale by threatening the – at one stage carrying assets worth But things didn’t quite work out as auctioneer with an interdict. On top of R10 million and property development imagined. McInnes was replaced by that, says Harris, the bank then sold worth R300 million and Harris adorned Jimmy Stott, who was a very different shares belonging to Mazlen to which it himself with the usual trappings of kettle of fish – he refused to increase had no rights whatsoever. Mazlen had success – a private plane, luxury cars, a the overdraft and instead demanded pledged certain shares to the bank, but vintage car and motorbikes. that Harris reduce the umbrella over- First National also signed transfer for But nothing lasts forever. In 1994 draft immediately. The bank, according unpledged shares. Harris suffered every parent’s night- to Harris, then tricked his ex-wife, get- Mazlen was liquidated. Harris took mare – he lost his adult son in a ting her to sign a suretyship in favour the matter to the appeal court in Blo- hijacking. Turning to Christianity, he of the bank, rather than a power of emfontein but lost. He managed to buy changed his whole outlook on money attorney, and asking her to sign bond back some of the properties into Mazlen and possessions, or so he says. “I gave documents for R590,000 rather than the Trust, which had held the company’s my life to the Lord on 11 May 1994,” anticipated R300,000. Even so, the bank shares. Harris laid theft, fraud and Harris intones. refused to extend the overdraft facility, duress charges with the police but no In 1997 things started going sour. and brought in an attorney, Christo- action was taken. Meanwhile Harris’ Mazlen was expanding but interest pher McEwan, to intimidate Harris into relationship with McEwan was deterio- rates went through the roof and things paying up on the overdraft. Harris was rating fast. So much so that he ended became very tight. But Harris wasn’t too told that if he didn’t allow the bank to up shooting McEwan at an evening

16 noseweek January 2007 meeting at McEwan’s office in Janu- into his estate, the contents of which ary 2000. Harris claimed he fired in led the magistrate, Mrs H Raath, to self defence. McEwan claimed it was send a report to the Master of the High attempted murder, with which Harris Court calling for an investigation with was duly charged. a view to criminal prosecutions. The at- Special deals He was granted bail of R6000, pend- torney for FirstRand’s directors, Robert ing trial, but attorneys and advocates Driman of Denys Reitz, sat through the for those in working for the bank persuaded the whole thing, so you’d imagine the direc- court to revoke the bail because they tors know exactly what it’s all about. In the nose. feared for their lives. Harris spent a any event, Harris has sent detailed af- www.payslip.co.za full nine months awaiting trial in the fidavits to the board of the bank, as well 0861 911 234 Johannesburg Prison, known unaf- as the banking ombudsman, Deloitte fectionately by inmates as “Sun City”. and PWC. The experience had a profound effect on FirstRand’s directors have had three Harris: for four years after his release “forensic reports” commissioned by their he worked in the prisons as a spiritual auditors, but they won’t show these to worker, introducing a “Read and Write” Harris. They also have a report, which programme into all 250 prisons. they refuse to let Harris see, prepared When the case came to trial, Harris by someone who spent six weeks in was acquitted, with the court saying that Driman’s office going through all the McEwan’s version couldn’t possibly be documentation. true. The day after his acquittal the in- Harris attended FirstRand’s AGMs in vestigating officer, Captain van der Bank, 2001, 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006 and on told Harris to lay charges of assault and each occasion asked for an investigation. CHELSEA TOUR 2007! perjury against McEwan – though he did In 2004 the bank tried to prevent Gardens of Delight so, the case was not pursued. Harris from attending the AGM but It gets better every year! To top it all, while Harris was in prison he slipped through their security net. Celebrate the next annual horticulture extravaganza. the bank had not been idle: it sequestrat- In February 2005, Harris finally got a See the finest English gardens on the ed his personal estate, selling his Oak- meeting with Ferreira and company 12th Anniversary Kirstenbosch lands home and putting his wife out on secretary Arnott, who told him they the street, along with two domestics who didn’t understand what all the fuss Chelsea Flower Show Tour. had worked for the family for many years. was about and asked him to explain. Departure date is May 19 – This is a man not short of opinions, He spent an hour with them but got But it’s a good idea to book who can spin a theory where a straight nowhere. Later that year he was physi- early for this swirl of lob might do. Why did the bank merci- cally ejected by bodyguards from the flowers, food and theatre. lessly pursued him? Harris points out company’s AGM. that Jimmy Stott is a cousin of Harris’ What does Harris actually want from Inquiries: Gillian Durrant ex-wife Hazel, and was jealous of Harris’ the bank today? Well, an apology and (021) 683 2838 and Hazel’s success. Why jealous? Be- a clearing of his name would be a good or 083 261 3961 cause the Stott family are snobs – Stott start. Though the bank, he claims, owes senior was also a bank manager – where- him some R50 million (which includes as Hazel Harris’s father was a mere punitive damages), as far as he’s con- electrician working for the Germiston cerned nearly all of this (R48 million) can Council. Another theory is that what go to charity. All he wants for himself is Harris calls the “Rupert gang” were keen something to help him look after his wife to get even with Harris when they took and the two domestics who were put out Calling fire station over the bank from Barclays. Harris, it of jobs when he was sequestrated. commanders! seems, had been involved in a number of He could certainly do with a spot of as- disputes with people in their circle, and sistance – Michael Harris, one time high had irritated the banking community by flyer of the Joburg northern suburbs, at Quality youngsters from Jack bringing a (successful) court case against 66 years of age lives with his wife in a Lundin’s unique upliftment project Absa for overcharging interest. one-bedroomed semi in Westdene and Goodbye Street now coming on Is Harris a man to let bygones be by- drives an old VW Golf. He runs his own stream. Ishmael, loyal, hard-work- gones? Hardly! He has a mission in more ministry, called World Hope is Jesus, ways than one. Harris has laid more making and giving away small silver ing, has Basic Ambulance, Fire- than 15 criminal complaints against the crosses carrying a Christian message. fighter 1 and 2, Hazmat Awareness bank, its directors, and various of its Should we feel sympathy for Harris? and Operational. Code 10 drivers. agents, including auditors Deloitte (who, The man’s probably his own worst en- Seeks position volunteer firefighter says Harris, secretly held shares in a emy. While there’s no denying he’s suf- anywhere for experience to assist liquidation company), Price Waterhouse fered the slings of outrageous fortune, Coopers (PWC) and attorneys Denys having once enjoyed his pretty share of in hunt for fulltime firefighter job. Reitz. He has filed complaints with the the pie, he’s absolutely obsessive and Please contact Jack Public Accountants and Auditors Board, finds it all but impossible to talk about the Law Society and the Bar Council. In the matter without shouting about the on (011) 268 2413 fact he has contacted more than 80 par- FRAUD, LIES and DECEPTION of or [email protected] ties on the matter. FNB, while never forgetting to PRAISE In 2001, Harris got hold of an enquiry THE GOOD LORD.

noseweek January 2007 17 DoctoredLaw fees Beware lawyers bearing contracts

Could the fact that the value of a property rose by some R130m after the purchase offer was made, have anything to do with the sellers’ eagerness to cancel the sale?

N INTERESTING LITTLE STORY played it- estate, and De la Hunt were joint reasonable prospect of transfer being self out in a recent arbitration. owners of a rather valuable piece of registered by 31 December 2005. It And, once again, it showed how property – a farm at Firgrove called also said that if transfer took place pisspoor our legal profession Zeekoeivlei (off the N2 between Cape after 31 January 2007 the price would can be. The main character in Town and Somerset West). go up by a cool R1,430,000. Aour story is an attorney by the name of So valuable, in fact, that the two You know what’s coming next of Norman John Osburn. Now you may managed to flog it to a company called course. Yes – by 30 September 2005 think he has a pretty Waspy name, but The Olympian Developing Company, transfer had not been registered and he’s got nothing on his sidekick in this which is run by a Greek businessman a few days later Osburn, on behalf story – Hebert William Garnett de la called Karmis, for a whopping R28 of the trust and De la Hunt, wrote to Hunt! million. And this Karmis obviously Karmis’ attorney, a certain Kyriacos, This Osburn, he’s no lightweight. In planned to work the land like any good and told him that they were cancel- fact he’s a senior partner at leading farmer would? Like heck – we’re talk- ling the agreement. Karmis was, we attorneys Webber Wentzel Bowens, ing yet another golf development here understand, a trifle miffed. So he went having previously been with Walker folks! to arbitration, claiming that the can- Malherbe. Turns out Osburn, in his Rezoning was required. As was a cellation was unlawful. And our friend, capacity as sole trustee of a deceased lot of finance – because Karmis, like Willie Burger SC (remember Gilmour, so many of us, didn’t Gant and Power – nose83), was ap- have a spare R28-mil- pointed to hear the matter. lion knocking about. So On what basis did Osburn think the sellers were careful. he could cancel? Had he completely They made it a term overlooked the provision about a of the contract that, re-extension? Not at all, said he – he should transfer not be was entitled to cancel because, in his registered by 30 Sep- professional opinion, Karmis would fail tember 2005, then they to get the finance he was seeking from would be able to cancel. Rand Merchant Bank. On top of that, But then they allowed he was worried about the lack of final- a term to be added ity about development rights. which they would live to Did Osburn have good professional regret. The contract said reasons for these doubts? You be that, even if transfer the judge. On 30 August 2005, a Mr was not registered by Bremer of RMB told Osburn that the 30 September, the par- loan was definitely proceeding. And ties would be obliged to on 29 September, Osburn spoke to a extend the term within Ms Farinha of RMB, who assured him which transfer could that the loan would cover the transfer take place until 30 June duty as well as the purchase price and 2006, provided that the that she would get back with info as to attorneys for the buyer when it would be advanced. and seller “in their Where’s the problem? Get real, said professional opinion and Ozzie at the arbitration, in my con- not as representatives siderable experience banks often drop of the views of either of their clients at the last moment. And the parties” were of the anyway RMB was not even contractu- view that there was a ally committed to advance the money.

18 noseweek January 2007

And it could still put forward all sorts Burger didn’t even comment on the of conditions which could kill the deal. fact that Osburn, as joint seller, could And on top of that, the development What does a not possibly have given an objec- rights were still up in the air. Why’s tive opinion. Nor on the fact that the that then Oz? Well, even though the wily old lawyer contract seemed to require that the rights have been granted, Karmis attorneys for both parties agree that hasn’t waived his right to appeal transfer was unlikely to take place. against the conditions which have “ Was there perhaps a little bit more to do when things been imposed by the authorities, so he Osburn’s insistence that transfer wasn’t might still appeal against them. Right! “ imminent? There’s no suggestion of You think someone who’s worked long don’t go his anything untoward in the arbitrator’s and hard to make a R28-million deal award, but an impeccable source tells us happen is now going put the kibosh on that the value of the property had risen it by appealing against the approval way? He goes on dramatically by 30 September 2005. In which he’s got for his plans?! fact a figure of R160 million has been Are you perhaps starting to think bandied about – which was all down that Osburn didn’t really want the deal appeal of course to the rezoning. If that isn’t an induce- to go through? In his award, Burger ment to break a contract, what is? was surprisingly soft on Osburn. He What does a wily old lawyer do when said that Osburn’s reasons for refus- things don’t go his way? He goes on ing to accept that transfer would take appeal of course – in this case Osburn place were unreasonable, as they were and De la Hunt have taken the arbi- hypothetical rather than related to trator’s award on review. It probably anything in the real world. And that doesn’t matter that the chances of Osburn seemed to have been generally success are slim – because if they can negative about Karmis – which was opinion was not professional. Which string it out until June 2007 it becomes apparently related to earlier dealings meant that there had been a breach of a whole new ball game. Because by which they had had. And that Osburn contract, and that Karmis was entitled then the rezoning approval will have should have made far more extensive to take transfer and that he should cer- lapsed, and the sellers’ bargaining enquiries before scuppering a R28-mil- tainly not be liable for the R1,430,000 position will suddenly become a lot lion deal. And, therefore, that Osburn’s penalty. stronger. ”

noseweek January 2007 19 Law Ugly scenes at Inanda Bowls Club

HE INANDA CLUB, hangout of Johan- plaints procedure, and complaining that couple passed, and Cameron uttered nesburg’s elite and home to he had had the misfortune of having a the infamous words that were later to Africa’s best-known polo ground, complaint preferred against him by Mrs become a major issue when Cameron has been shaken to its 73-year- Badsey which (except in one respect) sued Badsey for defamation. old roots. One of its bowls-playing was false and defamatory. Cameron’s four-day defamation case Tmembers, well-known attorney John The final paragraph read: “Needless against Erica Badsey started in the Cameron, has issued a stream of defa- to say, Badsey’s complaint impugned Johannesburg magistrates’ court early mation summonses in a long-running the writer’s good name, integrity and in 2004. It kicked off with a long and war against some of its most illustrious reputation, and for that she will pay. I emotional tirade from Cameron on the members. have issued a summons against her for subject of Erica Badsey. Cameron, 51, joined the Inanda club damages in an extent of R50,000. I will When he finally paused for breath, around 1989 and was a competitive not hesitate to do the same to any other Badsey’s attorney John Mendelsohn horse rider until he was struck down by Members who do likewise.” clapped his hands slowly in mock ankylosing spondylitis, a debilitating The events which led to the discipli- applause, for which he was sternly disease of the spine. He was finally was nary hearing were set in motion by the reprimanded by magistrate HF du ousted from the exclusive club after a fact that Inanda club has its own set of Plessis. Cameron responded by amend- series of colourful incidents over three rituals and procedures when it comes to ing his damages claim from R50,000 successive days in 2003, in which he the bowling green. You don’t just pitch to the magistrates’ court maximum was alleged to have: up there with your friends and have an of R100,000. (Mendelsohn is himself n Told bowls section committee arranged or “bounce” game together. something of a character. He rides with member Erica Badsey at a club meet- Instead, all players’ names go into a hat the Inanda Club’s famous Rand Hunt, ing: “How fucking dare you!” from which the teams are drawn by a of which he’s a life member, and in his ■ Called out to a newly-married committee member. youth streaked naked across the ball- couple as their horse-drawn carriage Cameron was convinced that these room floor at the club’s 1974 hunt ball). passed the bowling green en route for “blind” draws were rigged by committee Cameron described Mrs Badsey’s their wedding reception at the club: “If members, notably Dennis Robinson, the letter of complaint to the club chairman you need a good divorce lawyer I’ll give bowls section chairman. His discontent as “character assassination” that had you my card.” boiled over at a meeting in September caused him indescribable hurt. “I am a ■ Cried: “Go you effing ball go!” and 2003 when Cameron complained that person of the highest integrity, I pride then “fuck it!” when a wood he delivered a campaign had been orchestrated my integrity like the most precious veered off course. against him from becoming a member of jewel,” he said. For Erica Badsey, then 62, it was all the bowls committee, Mrs Badsey com- Asked by his advocate, Sam Cohen, if too much and she penned a letter of mented: “There was very little support he had ever heard Mrs Badsey swear, complaint to the Inanda Club’s then for you, because when you were previ- Cameron said: “Oh yes, gosh, she has chairman Frank Nightingale. A disci- ously on the committee you did little or said ‘oh shit!’ She has used that word plinary hearing was called, but in the nothing.” pretty regularly in response to a bad meantime Cameron issued summons Cameron replied: “How fucking dare delivery of a bowl.” against Badsey, claiming her letter you! How fucking dare you draw at- And bowls chairman Dennis Robin- defamed him and seeeking R50,000 tention to that fact when you are fully son? “He would deliver a bowl and it damages. aware of my personal circumstances?” may be a crucial bowl and he would say At the hearing, disciplinary com- While he’d been on the committee one of ‘oh fuck’, sort of swearing to himself. mittee chairman Sam Mattock urged Cameron’s children had died in a tragic Many, many times.” Cameron and Badsey to apologise to accident. Club chairman Frank Nightingale? each other and pleaded with Cameron The meeting broke up in confusion, “He has not sworn on the bowling green to drop his defamation action. Cameron According to Cameron, Dennis Rob- and I have never heard him swear in refused unless Mrs Badsey withdrew inson’s wife Anthea went “down the the bar area.” her written complaint and apologised passageway shouting and screaming Bowls committee member Val Night- to him. She wouldn’t. The committee like a barbarian, yelling at the top of ingale? “She uses the words ‘shit’ and found Cameron guilty of behaviour her voice”. He returned to the room and ‘fuck’ on the bowling green regularly,” unbecoming of a gentleman, and he was apologised for his language. said Cameron. “But when it comes to reprimanded with a caution. The following day Cameron had what the bar area, that is something to be- Days later Cameron pinned a three- he described as “the misfortune” to be hold! She uses the F-word with absolute page letter to the bowls hut notice drawn for a game against Erica Badsey. gay abandon. In all the years I have board, ranting about the club’s com- It was during this game that the bridal been at Inanda Club and all the years

20 noseweek January 2007 When it didn’t, he let rip with ‘go you fucking bowl, go!” Not so, said Cameron. The only time he used the F-word that day was during a very tense moment when Rudi Wolter stepped back from the mat and collided with him. “I said to him ‘if you think that’s the way you’re going to win the fucking game you’ve got another fucking think coming’.” Wolter’s recollection: “I can honestly say I did not hear him swearing.” Dismissing Cameron’s claim, magistrate Du Plessis said that Erica Bad- sey had a right to complain about a member’s conduct in terms of the club’s constitution, and the manner in which her letter was written was not defamatory. Cameron had not proved animus iniuriandi – intent to defame with the knowledge of wrongfulness. Cameron appealed against the dis- missal to Johannesburg High Court, where he lost again and was ordered Attorney John Cameron to pay costs on the punitive attorney- and-client scale. Judge NP Willis, sitting with Judge TM Masipa, refused that I have been alive, I do not think I distant future, I’m a lawyer, can I help Cameron’s application to appeal and have ever heard a woman swear with you?’ He then made as if to take a card last September his final appeal applica- the regularity that she swears – and from his pocket and went in the direction was refused by the Supreme Court nobody says anything.” tion of the horse-drawn carriage.” of Appeal (with costs). Cameron described himself as “an ex- His wife, bowls secretary Val: “Mr By then Cameron had launched sepa- ceedingly fine bowler” and a “skip”, the Cameron called out when the bride and rate defamation actions against Mrs highest position in a bowling team. In groom came past in a carriage: ‘I’m a Badsey’s three witnesses, claiming they his evidence he agreed that he is “prob- good lawyer, I can do your divorce in had defamed him in their evidence. In ably one of the most aggressive bowlers. a few years time’. He then pretended his high court appeal judgment, Judge I am extremely animated on the bowl- to draw this imaginary card out of his NP Willis observed that Cameron’s ani- ing green. I in many cases berate myself pocket. He turned towards the carriage mation was not confined to the bowling or berate the bowl that I am delivering. that was coming and made a few steps green: “He comes across as excitable, I use words such as ‘voertsek’ to my towards it.” emotional and even volatile. It is not bowls. I use words such as ‘oh bugger Not so, John Cameron countered in only ‘gentlemen’s clubs’ that have an it’.” Some members of the Inanda club, evidence. He had only commented to aversion to ‘lavatorial language’. As an he admitted, had “a problem with my fellow players: “I wonder if I should ask attorney the plaintiff does not have the animation”. the bridal couple whether they know a excuse of a limited vocabulary.” In the witness box, Badsey gave a good divorce lawyer, because I believe When Cameron’s case against witness slightly altered version of earlier writ- in a few years time they’ll need one. Dennis Robinson came up at Randburg ten complaint to the club chairman, Perhaps I should offer them my busi- magistrates’ court last July – Cameron when she said Cameron had called out ness card.” was seeking R50,000 damages from him to the passing bridal couple: “If you The following day Cameron was in a – the magistrate dismissed the claim, need a good divorce lawyer I’ll give you “tension-filled bounce match” at Inanda, with costs. No date has been set for the my card”. She now declared: “As the his fellow players being his friend Rudi attorney’s actions against Frank and bridal party went past, Mr Cameron Wolter, Pat Hawkey and the then 16- Val Nightingale – Cameron is seeking called out ‘shall I offer them my card, year-old Shereen Bryant.Erica Badsey R100,000 from each of them. they will need a good divorce lawyer.” was playing nearby and she heard While Frank Nightingale is unruffled She added: “I would not say he was call- Cameron exclaim: “Go you effing bowl, at the prospect of more days in court, ing out to the bride, it was just bravado. go!” And then: “Fuck it!” She assumed his wife has sleepless nights and is I consider it a tasteless joke, to me mar- he had delivered a wood and it had not terrified of attracting more summonses riage is a sacred thing.” gone where it was supposed to. “I said from John Cameron. Standing as a witness, Inanda Club to Mr Robinson ‘this is just too much. Last year attorney John Mendelsohn chairman Frank Nightingale, who I don’t come to play bowls to hear this wrote to Cameron: “While you complain viewed Cameron as “a colourful and kind of language’.” of people ‘trashing’ your good name, likeable character” said: “A horse-drawn Bowls chairman Dennis Robinson: “I your vendetta does little to add any lus- carriage came clippity-clopping towards happened to be at the opposite end of tre to your reputation. It portrays you the bowling green. Mr Cameron walked the rink when Cameron bowled. He’d as vengeful, as spiteful and as a bully towards that side of the green and said moved sideways, leaning over which is who abuses and misuses his position as words to the effect that ‘you are going some people’s style, trying to convince an attorney to drag people into court for to need a divorce lawyer in the not too the bowl it must go into the right area. frivolous reasons.”

noseweek January 2007 21 PropertyLaw

HE SCORPIONS HAVE been asked to probe a controversial “land swap” which enabled a developer to ob- tain 55ha of prime development council land in exchange for land Tthat he did not own. The council land lay slap in the middle of the 1060ha Meyersdal Nature Re- serve which Rian Booysen is developing outside Alberton on the East Rand, and Picture: where stands are now selling for up to R1.5m apiece. GETIT JHB SOUTH Pockets of land around Alberton still belong to the Meyer family, who once owned the enormous Elandsfontein farm where the town now stands. One such remaining pocket was 55ha of rocky koppies in the Meyersdal Nature Reserve, known as Portion 2 of the farm Elandsfontein. Booysen intended to buy it from the Meyer family and carve it into 262 stands for luxury housing. His company, Home Talk Develop- Personal development: Neil Diamond with his wife Justine, and Carla and Rian Booysen ments, had obtained development rights back in 2003, but Booysen’s dreams were shattered when the Gauteng department of development, agriculture, conservation and environment Scorpions called in over (GDACE) refused to authorise development in the green belt, and decreed that the scenic koppie should be preserved. Soon after, attorneys acting for “the owners and holders of real rights” on Ekurhuleni land swap the koppie wrote to the then MEC, Mary Metcalfe, claiming R131m in compensation for losses suffered by the refusal. Developer offered property that wasn’t his in In April 2004 Ekurhuleni executive mayor Duma Nkosi and his officers met exchange for council’s prime real estate, says activist with Mary Metcalfe at the council offic- es. Metcalfe was told that certain pieces of land, that were being conserved, koppie is “Meyersdal Trust”. Despite Trust to Kingtrade Investments and might be exchanged for other pieces of this, the minutes repeatedly insist that then to the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan land more appropriate for development. the “current owner” was Home Talk. Municipality.” Five months later, in September Metro’s attorneys, charged with A letter from Leola Meyer, acting on 2004, Booysen’s Home Talk wrote to checking the draft deed of exchange, behalf of the JGM Trust, confirms that Metro suggesting that the 55.3ha kop- wrote to the council pointing out “the the trust had entered into an agreement pie be exchanged for two portions of private property to be exchanged is not with Kingtrade for the “alienation” council land totalling 55.3ha. In that owned by Home Talk, as stated on the (sale) of the property. letter Booysen correctly stated that the draft deed, but by the “Pathem Trust” So there you have it. The Metro koppie was owned by a Meyer trust. – another Meyer family trust. The attor- councillors had allowed themselves to However, when the matter came neys “kindly advise the correct descrip- believe that Booysen owned the koppie, before the Ekurhuleni corporate affairs tion of the privately owned property and that he was generously offering to committee in April 2005 the minutes to be exchanged for the council-owned drop his R131m compensation claim reflected the “current owner” of Portion property”. against the provincial government if 2 (the koppies) as Booysen’s Home Talk The following month Booysen con- Metro agreed to swap 55ha of prime Developments. firmed that the koppie indeed remained development land for “his” koppie. Recommending approval of the land the property of the Meyer family. “We In fact, only when the land swap was swap, the minutes suggest “that the wish to confirm that the current land finalised – the agreement of exchange land exchange between council and owner is JGM Trust (yet another Meyer was signed on 23 January 2006 – did Home Talk Developments be in full trust) who has entered into an agree- Booysen finalise the koppie purchase, and final settlement of any claims that ment with a (Booysen-owned) company in order to hand it over to the council Home Talk Developments may have named Kingtrade Investment. Home formally. against the council.” Talk Developments (owner Booysen) is This, at any rate, is how the deal is A valuation report by De Leeuw Af- acting as agent on behalf of Kingtrade in seen by Nick Karvelas of the Open City rica Valuers is attached to the minutes. facilitating the transaction. The even- Forum, a group of local community It states the registered owner of the tual transfer will take place from JGM activists opposed to gated communities

22 noseweek January 2007 and “the use of public assets for exclu- Estate and is advertising 289 stands of swapped worthless land of 55ha for sivity.” around 1000 sq m, from R695,000. council’s valuable land of 55ha. “Booysen didn’t own the koppie, yet Sales person Marti says only 25 “Worthless? That land (the koppie) is in by promising to drop his demand for stands remain available, for R750,000 a nature area which we’ve stocked with R131m it was dressed up by the council upwards, with 1365 sq m going for game. We have 120 animals from ten to look as though he did, so they could R1.3m. Karvelas estimates that Booysen species – eland, kudu, black wildebeest, appease him by swapping it for its own stands to generate more than R200m in impala. We’ve created all the infrastruc- prime development land,” says Karve- land sales on the former council land. ture; we have topography with views.” las, who confirms that he has asked the Exclusive sales agents for Booysen’s Hans Meyer says the whole business Scorpions to investigate. entire nature estate – not just the latest of the sale of the koppie to Rian Booysen “The disposal of this public asset was 55h add-on – are Neil Diamond Proper- “is a bit complicated. There was a con- nothing short of a scam,” he wrote to ties of Alberton. tract and everything was in place. There Scorpions’ boss Leonard McCarthy. Owner Neil Diamond is also a Metro wasn’t just a transfer.” Meyer says that “Ekurhuleni Metro failed to ensure that councillor, and when the land swap transfer finally took place “not even a the disposal of this prime public land approval was recommended he sat on year ago” – i.e. after the land swap had was put out to tender, and the public the crucial corporate affairs committee gone through. How much did Booysen officials involved, starting with all the – he is quick to point out that he recused pay JGM Trust for the koppie: “Oh no, members of the Corporate Affairs Com- himself whenever he might have been that’s private,” says Meyer. mittee, assisted the developer in acquir- compromised. Karvelas estimates that Of Open Forum’s appeal to the Scor- ing a piece of prime public land.” Diamond’s commission on sales from the pions to probe the swap, Meyer says: The Scorpions have told Karvelas that 55h council portion alone will total at “Don’t people have enough work to keep his representations have been forwarded least R14m. them busy than trying to do such silly to their Gauteng regional office for as- Booysen confirms that at the time things?” noseweek had hoped to discuss sessment/investigation. the swap was approved the koppie was the land swap with Ekurhuleni execu- Karvelas tells noseweek: “The report owned by the JGM Trust and that his tive mayor Duma Nkosi, but he was not by Metro’s valuer states the council’s Kingtrade merely held development available. The office of city manager prime 55ha was only worth R7.7m. rights. Contracts for him to buy the kop- Patrick Flusk asked us to submit our Maybe that extraordinarily low figure pie had been “entered into two or three questions in writing. helped justify the council’s agreement years ago” but “only recently have the We did so: Is it correct that the mayor to the swap, but had it been put out to transfers gone through.” facilitated this land swap? Was the tender – as it should have been – that He agrees that a condition of the swap mayor under the impression that the ko- land would have been sold for at least was that he would drop his compensa- ppie land was owned by a Rian Booysen R90m.” tion claim of R131m. “Yes, you can say company? Was there an investigation Booysen has incorporated the council’s that. But it was part of a much bigger when it emerged that it wasn’t? prime 55ha into his Meyersdal Nature picture. The criticism says that I’ve Response? A deafening silence.

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Trouble in Paradise Raw deal in Rawsonville Did a bunch of farmers abuse their workers in a fruit-picking Western Cape dorp or was it a set-up?

N 13 SEPTEMBER 2006, the Cape farmers whose names were in posses- frenzied, “There’s already blood on Times published on its front sion of the Cape Times. the farmworkers and, unless it stops, page the following state- The article, based on allegations there’s going to be blood on the farm- ment as established fact: “In made at a trade union press confer- ers. We’re going to grab the land and April this year, a 22-year-old ence, set the scene for a frenzied media give it to its rightful owners!” Owoman was gang-raped, allegedly by campaign by unions and NGO’s work- “We farm workers will no longer four farmers and a farmworker in the ing in the farming sector. sit afraid and quiet while acts of ag- sleepy Boland wine farming village “This attack was an example of how gression take place against us. If no of Rawsonville. Her 15-year-old male farmers act with absolute impunity,” one else is committed to protecting friend was beaten so badly with iron declared Fatima Shaboedien of Women us, we will take justice into our own bars that he is now brain-damaged. on Farms. “We’re here today to declare hands,” said Sikhula Sonke’s general “Four of the alleged assailants are war ... we’re against violence, but if secretary, Wendy Pekeur, in a press prominent young farmers in the area. that’s what it takes to force rotten release. The Cape Times has the names of all farmers in the right direction, then we Such quotes appeared in all the local five alleged attackers.” must beat them in that direction! If press. The article, by freelancer Charlene the farmers continue abusing our farm However, on the day that the first Smith, was headlined “Wheels of jus- workers’ rights like mad dogs, then we Cape Times report appeared, West- tice turn slowly in Boland town” and must beat them to stop them, although ern Cape agriculture minister Kobus it went on to say that: “Five months that is the method of last resort.” Dowry asked Carl Opperman, head of later, no one has been arrested or “They’re going to shit themselves if Agri West Cape – the umbrella body charged.” This implied that staff at they don’t stop!” yelled Tony Ehrenre- representing the province’s farm- the Rawsonville police station had ich of ers – to go to Rawsonville, interview been guilty of a cover-up to protect the Cosatu, working himself up to a everyone concerned, and report back

24 noseweek January 2007 to him. It recommends that charges of perjury Economies of scale will inevitably Opperman was told that a farm and defeating the ends of justice be require larger units. It’s all about sur- worker who had resigned but had brought against the two women com- vival. The effect is already visible in stayed on in his farmhouse after plainants and that they be required to the impoverishment of rural areas.” finding employment elsewhere, had undergo polygraph tests. The decline in profitability is creat- threatened two women on the farm It also recommends that inspector ing more and more debt and greater that unless they laid charges of rape Matthey Ntshanga of the SAPS in unemployment. against the named farmers he would Ceres be charged with defeating the Asked why the unions show such harm them. He allegedly said he ends of justice. noseweek was unable to antipathy, local farmers claim that as would reward them if they did. Op- contact Inspector Ntshange who was conditions for farm workers have im- perman also found that the youth who off duty for several days. A colleague proved, so membership of the unions had allegedly been “savagely beaten” at the Ceres police station said that has declined and new members are with iron bars had in fact been injured he was not contactable because his proving difficult to recruit. The unions when a vehicle overturned while cellphone had been stolen. thus seize on sensational media re- hares were being hunted at night. The Spokesmen for the farming com- ports to justify their existence. Farm- unconscious youth was immediately munity are at pains to point out that ers also believe that Cosatu and the taken to the Eben Dönges hospital in ultimately the real victims of the false SACP are seeking to raise their profile Worcester, and then transferred to Ty- allegations that were so eagerly ex- in anticipation of going it alone in the gerberg Hospital in Cape Town where ploited by the unions as an excuse for next election. he spent two weeks. He subsequently virulent hate speech, are the workers On 18 December, four months after was returned to the Eben Dönges hos- themselves. Charlene Smith’s report and sub- pital for rehabilitative therapy and is If farming in the Breede River valley sequent threats against farmers by now back home with his parents. The is more profitable than it was, say, five the unions, the Directorate of Public youth’s medical file records that he years ago, it is only because had grazes on his head consistent with of agreements forged with having fallen from a moving vehicle major British chain stores and had suffered slight brain damage, such as Sainsbury’s. Acutely but there were no indications on his aware of modern consumer head or body that he had been subject- sensitivities, such contracts ed to a prolonged and brutal physical require that farm work- beating with iron bars. ers be treated humanely The farmers implicated in the and, say the farmers, they story denied being on the farm on the would be harming their own evening of the alleged gang rape and interests if they behaved had rock-solid alibis to support their otherwise. Winegrowers in contention. Opperman also included Chile and Australia would in his report to Dowry the fact that be quick to exploit adverse a policeman, based in Ceres, had in- publicity like the Cape volved himself in the case even though Times story and the union Rawsonville fell outside his area of response to it, to wrest jurisdiction. these lucrative contracts It was left to Die Burger to report, away from South African three months later, on 8 December, producers. Wine farming that the Police’s Independent Com- is labour intensive, so that plaints Directorate (ICD) had inves- any bankruptcies result in tigated the story in October and had comparatively higher num- found evidence suggesting that the bers of workers joining the Rawsonville police station entire rape and assault story was a ranks of the unemployed. fabrication. For reasons as yet un- At a farmers’ meeting in explained, this report, leaked to Die September Agri West Cape Burger, had been suppressed by the CEO Carl Opperman pointed out that Prosecutions effectively confirmed the police authorities, despite the ICD’s the government’s support of agricul- findings of Opperman and the ICD by own recommendation that its findings ture is the third lowest in the world declining to proceed with the prosecu- should be made public without delay. – despite the fact that agriculture is tion of the accused famers. noseweek has obtained a copy of the primary economic activity in most Agri West Cape has lodged a com- the ICD report which says there is rural towns. With its 7,185 farming plaint with the Human Rights Com- no truth in the allegations of rape, units, the Western Cape province has mission and asked it to investigate assault with iron bars or a cover-up the second highest number of farms charges of hate speech against the by the Rawsonville police. It says that and labourers, but also the highest various union officials, and is wait- it is clear that there was an ulterior farmers’ debt in the country. Western ing for a response. The organisation motive by more than one person in Cape farm labourers are the most said it was also considering laying making the allegations and that, as a highly paid, with a wage of 28,6% a complaint with press ombudsman result of the allegations, unnecessary above the national average. Ed Linington, but was waiting for a tension had been created between the “Seventy-seven percent of farms response from the HRC. SAPS and the local community and have a turnover of less than R1 mil- At the time of going to press, Ehren- that, consequently, morale was very lion, which leads one to wonder if reich had not responded to a message low at the Rawsonville police station. they will be forced out of the industry. left on his cellphone by noseweek.

noseweek January 2007 25 LawSiege of Troyeville Little Miss Nobody gives the lawyers a run for their money

OR YEARS Therese Boltar (née pleadings, has finally solved the riddle. there. Schamotta) has waged war with And the net is closing. Or might be. Back in 1997 Moodie & Robertson Moodie & Robertson, attorneys Mrs Boltar is a 69-year-old of some obtained a default judgment for unpaid to the City of Johannesburg, over mystery, who dodges questions about services against Mrs Boltar in her unpaid bills for rates, water, herself (“I just live by myself and I’m capacity as the bond holder and oc- Frefuse-collection and electricity, for an a little Miss Nobody”). For the past 16 cupier of another house in Troyeville, at extraordinarily elusive property known years she has lived in Sovereign Street, nearby 11 Bellevue Street. The sheriff as Portion 2 of Stand 431, Troyeville, Kensington. In 1987 she bought a pair served notice that he intended to attach Johannesburg. of semi-detached cottages at 1 William No 11 for the sum of R9,279 owing to noseweek, for a while as confused eve- Street in Troyeville, which she rents the council. ryone else – a succession of attorneys, out. She tells noseweek that despite “But I don’t own 11 Bellevue Street! the council, the sheriff, the Johan- repeated requests to the council, she’s And I’ve never lived there!” protested nesburg magistrate’s court – by Mrs never received accounts on 1 William Mrs Boltar. Her explanation, to become Boltar’s maze of memos, affidavits and Street, so she’s never paid for services a familiar refrain over the years, was accepted by the magistrate’s court and the default judgment was rescinded. Around 2002 there was a repeat performance, with Moodie & Robert- son now claiming R29,805. Mrs Boltar requested “further details” from the council, but with none forthcoming the default judgment was rescinded. A couple of years later, the thing was repeated. Last year Moodie & Robertson launched a fourth attempt to extract money from her. noseweek can’t quite understand why Mrs Boltar had everyone confused for so long. The council’s claim for unpaid services is against the Remaining Portion 2 of Stand 431 and Mrs Boltar is well aware that this refers to her property at 1 William Street. She also admits she has barely, if at all, paid for services there since she bought the place almost 20 years ago. Clearly, at some stage someone was led to believe that Portion 2 of Stand 431 referred to nearby 11 Bellevue Street. When default judgments started arriving for Portion 2 of Stand 431, why, you may well ask, did Mrs Boltar not set the record straight? In her court appearances she merely insisted that she does not own and has never lived at 11 Bellevue Street, a ploy which resulted in the rescission of a string of judgment summonses against her for services charges she clearly owes for 1 William Street. In March 2006 Moodie & Robertson issued yet another summons against Mrs Boltar, claiming R16,523 for unpaid services for Portion 2 of Stand 431. The summons again mistakenly gave her place of residence as 11 Bellevue Street, 315611 and since that’s where the document was delivered Mrs Boltar never received it.

26 noseweek January 2007 It was only last October that a letter “ from the council. We accept that, it hap- from Moodie & Robertson arrived at The lawyer airily pens; the City Council is not the most her correct address in Somerset Street, customer-friendly institution. But non- Kensington. But this time its ambigu- receipt of accounts does not free you from ous wording suggested that the latest explained away your liability to pay monthly charges.” default judgment awarded against her What now? Mrs Boltar is still ducking was a massive R110,599.65! the R110,599 as and diving over the R16,523 she clearly The Moodie & Robertson letter ran: “ owes on 1 William Street, and is once “As a result of the abovementioned ac- again requesting “further particulars”. count currently being in arrears in the ‘a typing error’ She prefers to focus on the inflated de- amount of R110,599.65, default judgment mand for R110,000. “This is R94,076.15 was granted against Mrs Boltar (nee more than the R16,523.50 actually Schamotta) on the 27th March 2006. granted,” she says. “This is blatant “We are proceeding to attach the “The summons bears the amount of dishonesty and I consider it fraud. Why abovementioned immovable property in R16,523 and she is bound [only] to that haven’t they apologised or explained to order to satisfy our client’s claim in re- amount.” me? I doubt I am the only one erroneous spect of assessment rates, water, refuse, Du Plessis confirms that Portion 2 letters have been sent to. I have sat in bin rental and sewer.” No mention of a of Stand 431, Troyeville, refers to Mrs court many times and watched while street address in this chitty. The letter Boltar’s cottage at 1 William Street. Moodie & Robertson have obtained declares that to avoid attachment, Mrs He points out that the summons only default judgments, one after the other. Boltar should pay the R110,599 “as a stated that she resides at 11 Bellevue The choice was: pay or we will attach matter of extreme urgency”. Street, not that she owns it. your property.” When noseweek tackled Moodie & “She doesn’t dispute the fact that Attorney Du Plessis hopes that at a Roberston’s Abrie du Plessis, the attor- she’s liable for municipal charges on the certain stage his firm and Mrs Boltar “will ney airily explained away the R110,599 Troyeville property [1 William Street],” come together and reconcile her accounts as “a typing error”. “Mrs Boltar should says the attorney. “Apparently for many and the thing will be settled. If it’s not set- not worry about the R110,000,” he says. years she had problems getting accounts tled we will have to fight at civil trial.”

noseweek January 2007 27 JOIN THE CLUB he skins of the sun- bedded blondes are all agleam, and the fairy lights round the trunks of the jacaran- das all atwin- kle, here in the gardens of Leinster Hall as dusk falls on Cape Town. It’s a large Shakur Olla and Karien Haasbroek crowd, well-bubblied. Some of Tus in danger of teetering over and joining the goldfish, as we crane to hear Clifford Jacobs’ speech at the opening of his two new restaurants in this exqui- site manor house behind the Mount Nelson. Clifford and his convention centre Dirk Elz- blonde wife Tabea, inga, knighted this year by creamier than ever in Queen Beatrix, presumably bosomy black lace, are for his fortitude in the face the owners of the Villa of onslaughts, like the recent Belmonte up the road, a big-deal guest invasion of 12,000 delegates for the establishment where you eat your oys- diabetes conference. ters and crayfish fresh from a seawater Of course everybody who’s anybody For a change it’s not another pure tank. Leinster Hall is older and more knows that Hilary Prendini Toffoli white Cape Town bash. German jour- venerable. When antiques dealer Peter nalist and event organiser Dagmar Visser was manager of the Nellie, he (above) is not just a cacophony of Schumacher has a quirky, diverse guest lived here with an orchard of fig trees in list. Married to Der Spiegel’s political what’s now the car park. colliding consonants. HPT, late of boff Paul Schumacher, she’s a consum- Not that tonight’s assembled partygo- glossy Style magazine and other mate networker who’s just landed a ers care a flying focaccia about Leinster German contract to write the screenplay socially conscious organs, has long of Pat O’Neill’s Lion in the Bedroom. Her small but heavyweight ebony been renowned for her observant collection includes the country’s most views on who’s coming and who’s travelled artist, Zwelethu Mthethwa, who’s represented in the Guggenheim going. noseweek takes great pleasure in welcoming her to a regular slot in this publication

her jeweller husband Uwe should find themselves on the same guest list as their former employee, Giuseppe Ciani, who’s just opened his own jewellery Spot the hand: Cliff and Tabea Jacobs with shop? Is that why Magda is protectively Michelle Maclean (centre) circling her diamond-bedecked clients like a ferocious sheepdog? What is Absolut’s Sharon Worrall Alex and Nelma Ruschioni Hall’s history. They’re far too busy Evans doing here without Mr Evans? hooking up with some contact who’s And why are Ton Vosloo and wife An- either sexually available or potentially nette seated on the steps? Worn out af- and is here on the eve of his departure useful, when they’re not looking for ter the 20th birthday bash of Ton’s lusty for Castro’s street party in Havana, another of the chef’s delicious little creation MNet, and Gwen Gill’s less- plus former Oprah magazine editor, the cheeky tasting portions. The social than-enthusiastic take on the party? shiny-eyed Taweni Xaba, who’s still on games are relentless. How did it happen Naturally this hard-core crowd speaking terms with Jane Raphaely that the formidable Magda Koetter and includes the high-energy MD of the surprisingly, and has dragged herself

28 noseweek January 2007 away from her promising new publica- later met Hemingway), tion The Deal, aimed at black business and he’s lived here with wannabees. his big-hearted, long-suf- I join them checking out the manor fering wife Romana for house’s Merriman Bistro and its more 50 years. His son lives upmarket restaurant next door, which upstairs and his daughter Clifford Jacobs has named the Laure- in the house next door. ate Room for the portraits of Mandela, Italian families stay close. FW, Tutu and Luthuli. Not to be sniffed Most of what crosses at. But for me the best stuff is up- this cynic’s path gets stairs. Here we have the colonial ethos La Famiglia Toffoli disparaged. I took him once to the bar at its most sublime – a bar, lounge at the Ambassador Hotel in Clifton and library all rigged out in the most and his reaction as everyone around us gloriously clubby décor, loads of deep THE FAMILY paused to gaze rivetted at the orange dark leather sofas and rich dark wood, ilvio Berlusconi and sun sliding dramatically into the navy leading out on to a deliciously latticed Emilio Toffoli – yes, my sea was a sardonic “Beh! Better sunsets verandah overlooking the garden. husband – were born in Kenya!” Yet you won’t get past the silken cord on the same day in Ernesto’s nemesis on this particular at the bottom of the winding stairway 1936. But that’s not the family visit is its youngest member, if you haven’t paid the R5000-a-year it reason Emilio wanted the tousle-headed three-year-old son will cost you initially to join the Cape to celebrate his 70th in of Emilio’s eldest daughter by his first Town Club. They’re the owners of the Italy. He wanted a jolly marriage. A clever little charmer from building. This is their club house. I family reunion. Jozi, Alex has his grandfather’s iron don’t personally It’s while we’re try- will, and a smart habit of screeching know any mem- ing to position 15 of like a banshee when anyone he consid- bers apart from Emilio’s close relatives ers irrelevant tries to thwart him. deputy chair- for a Victorian-style dynasty photo in Naturally these two clash the minute person Don- his sister’s livingroom that I get the we get them into position under the wald Pressly, a first inkling this is not going to be your curly gilt mirror. Alex wants to share a parliamentary Snormal family get-together. pouffe on the floor with his adored teen- correspondent We’ve come all the way here to the age cousin Gianmarco, bass guitarist in who lives near village of Roverbella where Emilio was a punk rock band, but Ernesto’s bony me and whom I born, south of Lake Garda – from Cape knees are getting in the way. Age wins chance upon try- Town, Johannesburg and Florida in the this time. ing to persuade United States. Yet it’s soon clear we The odd thing is that while everyone Taweni Xaba have no more control over the way the is telling everyone else why they’re to join up. He’s birthday visit will pan out than we have sitting in the wrong place, Luigi the cheerfully dish- over Jackie Selebi’s future back home in photographer, who’s earning molti eu- ing out Cape South Africa. ros to be here, feels no need to assist in Town Club The room where we’re gathered in this maneuvering. Nor has he brought Annette and Ton Vosloo membership this 150-year-old manor house has any kind of impressive lighting para- forms at this ex- special significance. According to the phernalia. clusive gathering. plaque on the wall, it’s where Garibaldi “Non importa. Bonz flash,” he tells me Along with free entry to the bar lounge, made the mistake of offering “his morosely, waving at the frescoed ceil- members get reduced dinner rates, glorious sword” to King Carlo Alberto ing, clearly convinced bounce flash will access to the speakers’ programme, to drive the Austrians out of Northern save the day. reciprocity at like-minded clubs all over Italy. In his usual excitable way, the In five minutes he does 10 shots the world. red-bearded revolutionary was trying and then disappears. Has he gone to But even the fact that the club has to unify Italy. But the king had no guts change the film in the studio across the a female chairperson for the first time for warfare and gave him a “historic road where his father and grandfather in its history is not enough to make me refusal”. had a barbershop? We wait. No. Shoot want to become a member, no matter Frankly, they both look a tad har- terminato. how seductive those leather sofas. It’s assed in the elaborately framed etching The results turn out to be hilariously not that I subscribe to the Groucho on the wall, opposite the swirly-backed hopeless, even though this is not a bad- Marx notion that you don’t want to Victorian lounge suite where Emilio’s looking family. . join a club that will accept you. It’s the hybrid family is attempting to arrange Gianmarco’s sister, Irene, a willowy numbing weight of all that illustrious itself prettily for what is known as pos- black-eyed dental student, could make pipe-smoking lineage. Do I need to terity. Not simple at all. For starters, the cover of Vogue any time, while belong to an institution that’s a merger the age range. Giuseppe the truffle-hunting antiquar- between the Here XVII Club and the Oldest is 87-year-old Ernesto, Emil- ian, who has fatted the goose for our City and Civil Service Club, which itself io’s brother-in-law. A fit, perceptive, visit, could give Antonio Banderas a run is a combination of Cape Town’s two crabby old chauvinistic bugger with an for his money. oldest clubs, the City Club, founded extraordinary command of English and And Emilio’s three daughters all pos- in 1878, and the Civil Service Club French expletives. He inherited this sess the vivid features of their father founded in 1858? I’d have to have the mansion while he was working on the in his youth when he was spotted by a mindset of a male Margaret Thatcher. Kenyan farm where he’d been a pris- Cinecitta scout on the Visconti set of And enjoy wearing a kilt. oner in World War Two (and where he an Alida Valli period saga, but chose

noseweek January 2007 29 not to go to Rome and become the next ally lively middle-aged blonde who’s ally, he told her that on the day Emilio Marcello Mastroianni. not from Roverbella, and whose food arrived in the world, the Spanish rebels Yet in the colour pic we all manage to therefore the locals consider suspect. issued a decree nominating Franco as look drained and/or dopey under Luigi’s Even so, this is where Emilio decides supreme commander. bonz flash. Worse, in every single shot, he wants to have his birthday bash, the Emilio’s speech is followed by several several eyes are closed. minute he walks into the bar and sees more in both languages. Everyone gets And the cultural gap yawns. While on the wall a framed sepia photo of his very emotional except Ernesto, who’s the South Africans grin away like uncle’s trattoria in the thirties. bored, and three-year-old Alex, who by excited sheepdogs, none of the Italians Ernesto thinks he’s crazy. At lunch now is in bed in the converted stables, show any cheesy teeth. Is this a sophis- later he tells Emilio that the Osteria al being tormented by the same mosqui- ticated European thing? Or are they a Cantone is nothing but a hole. Always toes that chased his grandfather out of tad pained at having been landed with was a hole, even when it was the Tof- Roverbella 52 years ago. far too many South Africans at one go, folis’ Trattoria Al Buon Gusto. all crammed into Ernesto’s converted Things could get ugly, but Emilio stables at the bottom of the garden? respects the old man whom he once THE BIRTHDAY MENU Whatever, this haphazard family followed to Kenya. So he simply leaps ne of best things portrait will not thrill to the family’s defence, waxing lyrical about living in the posterity. Ernesto gets about the “endless stream of tagliatelle Po valley is the food. it right when he says that emerged from that little kitchen” You’ve never seen we look like a gather- which was “so delectable that the anything like the size ing of the inmates of place was always full of farmers and of Po valley sows. a correctional institu- merchants stuffing themselves.” And When they come at tion. so what if it wasn’t gourmet, he says. you full tilt, it’s like Not that Roverbella Then, loyalty bolstered by memories of being run down by a has ever been the making wine with his uncle, he recol- small Fiat. They’re kind of old-stones- lects how he and his friends would all much bigger than the and-bougainvillaea, help Zio Angelo crush grapes in a vat, males, which have to Bella Italia village holding on to each other and stamping perform miracles, so God equipped them you see in movies like and singing. And how his aunt would with genitalia shaped like corkscrews. Room with a View. afterwards boil the freshly pressed juice Even against tremendous odds they Muggy in sum- with flour and sugar and make a deli- Omanage to sire record-breaking litters of mer, foggy and frozen cious sweet they called sugol. adorable piglets. in winter, its lousy Ernesto remains unconvinced. He But there’s no room for sentiment. weather is one of the goes off muttering to his cantina, the Pigs are a staggeringly lucrative busi- reasons Emilio left outhouse cellar in which he keeps ness in the Po valley, and their fate in Tongue in cheek: when he was 18 and bottled porcini mushrooms and Ro- this industrious region is to provide the Emilio Toffoli and headed for Kenya. mana’s salsa di pomodoro, along with greedy multitudes with mountains of daughter Physically it’s not roll- his garagiste grappa, secretly distilled salami, coppa, pancetta, cotechino and ing Tuscany either. No by a friend in a wonderful contraption the superlative prosciutto, which the cypresses except in the graveyard. No consisting of a copper coil welded to an world knows as Parma ham. olive trees on the horizon. It’s as low in aluminium milk can. So naturally the first thing on the flat fertile Po valley as you can go, However, he’s there at the party a Emilio’s birthday menu is Prosciutto e with the manure smell of the dairy farms week later, toasting Emilio in Veuve Melone – translucent slices of Parma and pig farms hanging cosily in the air Clicquot before dinner in the bar, where ham eaten with wedges of what we call wherever you go. we’re all hacking off slivers of parmi- Spaanspek. That’s just the antipasto. Ten kilometres away, as you enter Vero- giano from a giant wheel laid out by It’s followed by tortellini in brodo, a na territory, you begin to see the foothills of the indomitable blonde, who looks as if clear tasty broth containing a kind of the Alps, but down here it’s the platteland she’s been at the grappa. round baby ravioli filled with minced – canals, rivers, rice-paddies, farmhouses Emilio’s memories become more pork and chicken. and fields of fruit and vegetables. People poignant as the evening progresses. In Then comes Baccala con Polenta. Salt have thrived on these productive Lom- his speech he switches from Italian to cod from the northern waters has been bardy plains since the Etruscans. English for his sons-in-law, recalling his eaten by the poor in Mediterranean The town itself is not tourist fodder mother’s description of how, as she lay countries for centuries, and as a child in either. The old buildings lack charm. waiting for him to arrive, she could hear war-ravaged Italy, Emilio loved it eaten The piazza is insignificant. And the someone singing Aida in the restaurant flaked over slices of grilled polenta. narrow main road is a constant hum of below, in between snatches of Mussolini The main course is Quaglie Ripiene, lorries from Mantua to Lake Garda. on the radio. baby quails stuffed with walnut pate One of those lorries killed Emilio’s aunt, Her sisters were there too, and her and served with spinach and pureed Zia Margherita, as she was fetching bread mother, but the person she was yearning potatoes. Not for the faint-hearted. for the family trattoria on the main road. for was Emilio’s father. A captain in the For those who have any space left after She ran this busy eating house with Zio Italian army, he was in Spain helping this lot, there’s brisolona, a crumbly cake Angelo, Emilio’s father’s brother, and it Mussolini’s pal Franco take over the made with polenta, flour, almonds and played a part in Emilio’s life. He was born government. He’d brought his family to lemon peel. Speciality of Mantua. Rich in one of the rooms above it. Roverbella before leaving Italy, so his with butter, it cries out for a few sips of a In Toffoli hands for decades, it’s still wife could have the baby in his brother’s humbling Italian liqueur like Frangelico, there, a pleasant little country inn with home, in the village where she was born. or regulation grappa, followed by a mean a small bar, now owned by an unusu- When he returned from Spain eventu- dark espresso.

30 noseweek January 2007 Virgin territory

Private Apartments The veil behind the TO LET FULL FACILITIES • TV • SECURITY sexy Cell C voice LONDON £80 per day* between Park Lane and Grosvenor Square NEW YORK $100 per day* HE LATE ADVERTISING MOGUL David Ogilvy, Saudi tycoon Dr Nasser Al-Rashid, owner Midtown/E63rd & Madison Ave who knew a thing or two about of Rashid Engineering (which owns PARIS €100 per day* building successful brands, was Lanun Securities, which owns 15% of 206 Rue de Rivoli on Tuileries Metro Station fond of quoting this piece of dog- Cell C), is a staunch advocate of wom- gerel to novice creatives: en’s rights. Although that seems highly CELL 082 445 1804 or TIf the client moans and sighs, make his unlikely considering his close personal Tel/Fax: 021 712 1712 logo twice the size. relationships with the royal patriarchs. It Interested in Inca Hiking Trail & Machu If he still should prove refractory, show would also contradict the testimony of one Pichu? Give me a call! a picture of the factory of his ex-wives who has accused him of EMAIL: [email protected] Only in the gravest cases should you keeping her a virtual prisoner, forcing her *Costs apply for stays of 3 or more days. show the clients’ faces. to cover her face, even when travelling Cost of 1 or 2 days extra 25%. Wise advice, ignored by many, includ- abroad, and supporting the death penalty ing David Ogilvy. And certainly by Sir for adulterous women. Richard Branson, who is currently ap- Perhaps the Lebanese Hariri brothers, pearing as himself in Virgin’s TV ad for owners of Saudi Oger, and therefore 60% NEED TO CATCH A SNAKE? mobile number portability. of Cell C, are more liberal in their views, Africa’s premier snake catchers It’s a cheap, nasty and narcissistic but I can’t see them actively campaigning (We’re not bad at sharks either) production, particularly when compared for the right of Saudi women to choose Mercantile Investigation to Cell C’s spot for the same facility: the their careers, husbands or outer garments, Litigation support one with the cute little “number” people never mind their public representatives. Recoveries & left behind at the airport and then being You don’t build a hugely successful busi- resolutions waved through security and changing ness empire in an absolute monarchy by challenging the foundations of power. Especially when so much of your busi- Tel: +27+83 357 8555 Perhaps Saudi tycoon ness comes from government contracts [email protected] and royal palaces. Dr Nasser Al-Rashid is a staunch But this is not the sort of thing you want to broadcast to the freedom-loving supporter of women’s rights consumers of a democratic country. Instead, you engage experts to invent a name and image better suited colour and being joyfully reunited with to the trading environment. Like Cell C. their subscriber. Sexy, individualistic, proudly South Afri- COMPANY DIRECTORS Websec offers 24-hour online information on With its emotional pull, clear message, can and terribly keen on good causes like directors of all SA-registered companies. memorable music track and plenty of “Bring a Girl Child to Work Day”. Low volume searches branding, it’s hard to fault. None of which is acceptable in Saudi. (1000 pa) for R2750 plus VAT. All kudos to agency Net#Work BBDO, Even the charming and innocent Mo- Contact [email protected] who have done such a splendid job over bile Number Portability ad could not be the past five years creating an appealing flighted in the Kingdom without being façade for the faceless network operator. completely reshot. All the cute little There are faces behind Cell C of course, women would have to be togged out in but they are not the kind you want in your full-length abayas and veils and all the advertising. Not when you are building a cute little men would have to be mem- This space is a snip at hip, sexy, individualistic young brand. bers of their immediate family. The sexy This applies less to the company’s female voice would have to go and there much-trumpeted BEE component, now would be none of that rolling around on O N LY shrunk to just 25%, than to the mysteri- the floor and hugging stuff either. ous people who own the corporations that It’s almost enough to make you port own the rest. your number straight to Virgin. Even if Truth is: every time some free-spirited you don’t like Richard Branson, at least young South African tops up her Cell you know who he is. Unfortunately, he’s R750... C call credit, a big chunk of her money the guy who chose to share Virgin Mo- finds its way into the pockets of men who bile’s South African operation 50/50 with, believe she should be covered from head uh, Cell C. to toe, forbidden from driving a car and se- We think we’ll just stay with our Why not try it for size? verely punished for going out on her own. current operator, in spite of the damn [email protected] But perhaps that’s unfair. Perhaps the meerkat.

noseweek January 2007 31 Web dreams Marike Roth

Scatterlings of Africa

HOULD AULD ACQUAINTANCE be forgot and their contact details? Wouldn’t that be never brought back to mind? Some- nice? times. That’s exactly what Amanda Tsinonis, But haven’t you ever wondered the founder of SAReunited.com, thought what happened to the girl with the one lonely day in London in 2002. I caught Sfunny laugh you sat next to in art class up with her in cyberspace and interviewed in Standard 6? Or the guy who barfed on her by email. “We are a very disparate your brand new shoes during your first If it nation,” she said. “Bringing everyone date in Standard 9? Or what became of together under one virtual roof seemed the kid everyone said was sure to end up like a good thing to do.” So she created in jail? were not SAreunited.com (www.sareunited.com), I sometimes wonder whatever happened a website for South Africans to reconnect to Herbie Meek … I was 10 years old and with each other. hanging out with the boys in the park for that “From there the idea grew – that when the Matthew brothers took a bet reuniting South Africans is not just for that Herbie was stronger than me. This those living abroad. Every single South was a grave insult because even though Matthew African has at least one person from school Herbie wasn’t much smaller than me, he or varsity that they wonder about – where was three years younger. I did protest are they now – what are they up to – what too much and was challenged to a fight. boy, I happened to your first love, your favorite Herbie and I put up our dukes. We went teacher, that school bully?” at it, he thumped me, I pulled his hair. More than half a million South Africans We rolled and we tumbled. Damn that swear I have signed on. Members register for free Herbie, he was much stronger than on the site and can then do a name search I thought. After five minutes of for their friend, or search for their school, vigorous struggling, I concluded he would university or military unit and see the was winning, and ran home crying. names of their old friends listed there. For The next day I was surprised the price of pigging out on your favourite when Herbie sought me out and have take-out meal, you can also get their apologised. “Sorry hey,” he said, “I contact details. don’t want to be bad friends with There’s something voyeuristic you.” Which left me gobsmacked, kicked about checking out old friends and because I was expecting to hear acquaintances, in seeing the mouse who the blood-tingling taunt every became a successful entrepreneur, the child dreaded being broadcast your ugly ducklings who turn into swans – and across the park: “Wehla- vice versa. “There is a curiosity in us kepehla, rick-stick-stella!” all, dying to be satisfied,” says Amanda But no, Herbie was a true scrawny Tsninonis. “I call it the Nosiness Factor!” gentleman. Sometimes I wonder Nosily, I did a search for Herbie Meek, whatever became of him… but unfortunately he wasn’t lurking there. South Africans are different from little arse The chances are, though, that you’ll find people of other nationalities. Ask several people you know on SAReunited. any American, Australian or Brit if com. I did. they have friends and family living back into To Herbie, wherever you may be, thank overseas. The chances are they’ll you for not being an arsehole and calling say no. Ask any South African the me a crybaby. But just for the record, you same question and the chances are yesterday didn’t win because you were stronger than they’ll know several. me. It wasn’t because you had me in an As Johnny Clegg once famously arm-lock and my face was in the dirt and I sang, “We are the scatterlings of had mud in my eye. I could have wriggled Africa.” We’re spread all over the out of your grip easily if I had just pulled world, and as the years fly by, it’s so your hair a little harder. You won because easy to lose touch with old friends. I had a crush on one of the Matthew boys. Don’t you ever wish there was a When he cried out “Go Herbie!” my whole website where you could type in a : Meg Jordi world crumbled. I lost my will to fight. friend’s name and instantly access If it were not for that Matthew boy, I all their information, such as recent swear I would have kicked your scrawny

photos, what they’ve been up to and Illustration little arse back into yesterday.

32 noseweek January 2007 Law of the B®and Hans Muhlberg Sneaky or stupid?

OME 18 MONTHS after they were put out for whereas international law is more in their comment, the South African domain favour. As we know from the Constitutional name dispute regulations have been Court’s judgment in the Black Labour T- finalised. And they’re worse than ever. shirt case, it’s now pretty difficult to show For the benefit of readers with lives, As we know when a known brand has been diluted. Sthe issue at hand is “cyber-squatting” – the An appeal procedure has been intro- practice whereby morally disadvantaged duced, which suits big brand owners who persons register well-known brand names as from the can afford to keep things going. And, most domain names, then hold the brand own- bizarrely, the procedure for deciding who ers to ransom. Though for years it’s been will hear the appeal appears to allow this to possible to oppose dotcom domain names Constitutional be done by company directors of one of the registered in bad faith, the latest regulations parties involved. Yet the regulations insist now also include provision for objections to a Court’s they must be impartial – go figure! An ap- co.za domain name registration. peal procedure also suits lawyers, of course. You may now object to a co.za name if you In fact, there’s little doubt that a whole have rights to the same name or a similar judgment industry will grow up around this – law name and you feel that the registration firms advising their clients of domain name takes “unfair advantage” of, or is “unfairly in the Black registrations that “must” be opposed. Loads detrimental” to, such rights. A complainant of objections, loads of appeals. may choose for the issue to be heard by a So welcome to the future – which may single adjudicator – at an an eyebrow-raising Labour T-shirt look like this: R10,000 – or a panel of three, at a jislaaik- You start a hardware store and you call uttering R24,000. Not exactly cheap. (Provi- it Integrity. There is an insurance company sion is made for financial assistance, but this case, it is now called Integrity (the founder had a sense of is likely to be confined to where the objection humour), but you’re advised that no one will is based on offensiveness.) pretty difficult be confused. Your chosen domain name www. The adjudicators will be made available by integrity.co.za is acceptable because the in- accredited providers (law firms or companies surance company has registered www.integ- created by them, one suspects). As for which to show that ritylife.co.za. But claiming that its name has firms and companies will be accredited – the been “diluted”, Integrity objects, and chooses regulations read like one of those institutional a well-known which accredited provider will decide the job ads where the selection has already been matter. The insurer wins. You’re aggrieved made but protocol demands an advertise- but the R24,000 appeal fee counts you out. ment, so the appointee writes the job spec. It’s brand has been You run a transport business called Mov- clearly envisaged that the providers will be ers not Shakers. Not too computer savvy, pretty large firms. you don’t register the domain name. A large Are the new regulations sneaky or just diluted competitor that has been trying to buy you stupid? Take the fact that, though it is recog- out then registers www.moversnotshakers. nized that companies may abuse the system co.za, which you interpret as a hostile act. by complaining despite having no real case You stump up the R10,000 for an objection – a practice known but, inexplicably, you lose. You put together as “reverse domain the R24,000. The accredited provider ap- name hijacking” – they points an appeal panel. All three-panel provide no deterrent for members are directors of the competitor. such abuse. No name You run an escort agency called Slag- and shame, no costs House. You manage to register the name as order! a trade mark because anything goes these Adjudicators may be days. Your racy billboard ads are fine be- guided by national, for- cause the ASA is now totally cool – it doesn’t eign and international even have a problem with the Teazers ads. law, but there’s no indi- You register www.slaghouse.co.za. Some cation of which should pain objects, saying it’s offensive to women, be given preference. and an equally painful adjudicator agrees. Which is interesting So no website under your trading name. A because trade mark law Free State butcher also objects but he’s told in South Africa is not that though there is a fair bit of mutton exactly going the way of Illustration : Meg Jordi dressed as lamb involved here, he really the big brand owners, hasn’t got a leg to stand on.

noseweek January 2007 33 LawNoseArk

UST BEFORE CHRISTMAS, the Botswana High Court at Lobatse brought that country’s longest running and most expensive court case to a close by granting the Bushman applicants the right to returnJ to their homes in the Central Kala- Picture: hari Game Reserve (CKGR). As noseweekers will know, the Botswana International Survival government has for the last decade or so waged a long-winded and often violent campaign against the Gana and Gwi Bushmen, forcing most of them out of the Reserve into bleak resettlement camps. (When the massive reserve was proclaimed in the 1960s, Bushmen were given the right to remain inside it and move freely across its borders without a permit, a right not granted to any other people, black or white.) One of the reasons given by the govern- Truth dawns: Bushmen leaders Jumanda Gakelebone (left) and Roy Sesana (centre), hear the ment of Botswana for moving the 2000- Botswana court’s decision opening the way for their return to the Central Kalahari or-so Bushmen out of the CKGR was that it was meant to be place for wild animals. Bushmen, as we all know, live by hunting, and the inhabitants of the CKGR were certainly reliant on hunting for survival. On the face of it the government is correct Half a victory not to allow hundreds of hunters to live and to deny them horses and donkeys would kill within a game reserve – it sounds like unfairly restrict their mobility in the vast a recipe for disaster. Unarmed tourists are area. (The Bushmen, thank goodness, don’t the only people who should be encouraged have the budget for a large fleet of 4x4s). to go to game reserves, surely? Whether the government is right or A closer examination of the facts shows wrong about domestic animals is up for dis- that game populations in the CKGR actu- cussion – they definitely could have a nega- ally rose significantly during the last ten tive impact on the Reserve if not properly years of Bushman occupation of the park. managed. However, what is clear is that

Clearly, the numbers they were taking were Many Bushmen possibly the most ecologically destructive not at all significant in the greater ecology of the Bushmen’s domestic animals, goats, of the area. The Bushmen claim that they were in fact introduced to the CKGR by the know enough about nature not to overdo and their government themselves back in the 1970s things, and the statistics bear them out. as part of a development programme. All We’re also often blind to the impact that through the 1980s and much of the 1990s tourists and their infrastructure can have supporters they weren’t an issue. They only became a in a protected area. The Kruger National problem when the government decided to Park, for example, has thousands of people, claim that the kick the Gana and Gwi out. mostly staff members, living in it perma- Any professed concern for the CKGR by nently. There are hundreds of kilometres“ of the government should be taken with a tarred roads, airstrips, rubbish dumps and main reason for pinch of salt. The small amount of dam- even (horrors!) a golf course. All this has an age that the Bushmen may have done impact on nature that we seldom, if ever, by hunting or“ bringing domestic animals read about. moving them into the area is vastly outstripped by the As tourists, we don’t like to think that Botswanan state’s veterinary fences, which we can actually inflict severe damage on have cut off game migration routes and the areas that we visit. Stopping low-level out of the CKGR decimated wildlife throughout the country. hunting and promoting tourism could make The government also makes no secret of the the CKGR ecologically worse off. (Several fact that it is actively promoting mining in concessions for the operation of upmarket was to make way the CKGR – perhaps the least eco-friendly game lodges have recently been granted in human activity possible to have in a game the Reserve.) for mining reserve (it has been handing out prospect- The Botswana government has also ing leases in the Reserve for just about recently found a bee in its bonnet about every mineral one can think of to numerous the domestic animals – goats, horses, dogs companies, local and foreign). and donkeys – kept by the Bushmen in Many Bushmen and their supporters in the CKGR, and has used them as another fact claim that the main reason for mov- motivation to remove settlements from the ing them out of the CKGR was to make Reserve. The Bushmen say that if they way for mining, chiefly diamond mining can’t keep goats, they’ll have to kill more (as we reported years ago, a possibly-viable wildlife to survive. They also claim that deposit has been found at a place called

34 noseweek January 2007 Gope within the reserve). De Beers, the Billiton doubtless noted the negative evictions came to the fore in the 1990s. holder of a lease at Gope, claims there publicity that De Beers attracted by By 2001 the parks people had drawn up would be no need to move the Bush- prospecting in the CKGR, and decided a management plan for the CKGR that men out of the Reserve to make way to play a Russian doll game to prevent allowed the Bushmen to stay within the for mining, and that in Botswana, all its name being dragged through the park. This plan needed to be signed by subsurface minerals belong to the state. mud by human rights activists like the President of Botswana to take legal However, critics point to the recent Survival International, the London- effect. However, just before he was due legal decision in South Africa that gives based NGO that has supported the to sign it, Survival International (the rights to mineral profits to local people Bushmen through the recent court case. London-based NGO previously men- in the Northern Cape as evidence that (Kalahari Diamonds has since been sold tioned) began an awareness campaign De Beers would prefer uninhabited to a company called Petra, and is now around the evictions of Bushmen from mining zones so as to have less chance very actively drilling prospecting holes their ancestral lands and torture of for claims to a proportion of the largesse throughout the CKGR). Bushmen by parks service employees. extracted from them. Godi is interesting because the The President of Botswana then refused In fact, since the evictions of the only Botswana citizen on its board of to sign the management plan. Bushmen began, there has been a directors is Archie Mogwe, ex-minister Ditshwanelo immediately accused massive increase in prospecting leases of minerals and now adviser to the Survival of meddling in local issues granted by the state within the CKGR. President of Botswana (in Botswanan and of having derailed constructive One of the main recipients of these new mining, it’s not done to leave govern- negotiations between the government leases is the world’s largest mining ment bigwigs out of the piggie trough). and the Bushmen. Inside sources told company, BHP Billiton. Billiton, besides Archie is the father of Alice Mogwe, the NoseArk at the time that the provisions prospecting for coal, also created a big wheel at Botswana’s most high-pro- in the Reserve management plan that subsidiary called Kalahari Diamonds to file human rights NGO, Ditshwanelo. would have allowed the Bushmen to prospect for diamonds in the Reserve. Ditshwanelo has in the past negoti- stay were hidden away in the depths of Kalahari, in turn, created a subsidiary ated between the Bushmen and the Bot- the document. The Bushmen and their called Godi. swana parks service when the issue of supporters in the parks service had been hoping that the President would assent to the plan without having read it properly. Clearly, they felt that the government wanted to go ahead with A moment of silence the evictions and felt they had to resort to subterfuge to keep the Bushmen in Picture: the Reserve. Ditshwanelo has since kept up the Stephen Leatherwood/Baiji.org pressure on Survival, accusing it of wanting to bring the international image of Botswana into disrepute, and saying that the eviction of the Bushmen from the CKGR is a domestic issue that has nothing to do with outsiders (like apartheid, we wonder?). What is telling is that Ditshwanelo has provided no material support to the Bushman applicants during the court case (“They showed their faces in the public gallery a few times”, a source told NoseArk). Are they mere apologists for the Botswana regime? Has Archie Mogwe been leaning on his daughter? Ditshwanelo has an ally in their fight against foreign interference in another “Bushman rights” NGO, Kuru. Kuru, surprise surprise, gets funding from De Beers. All this reminds NoseArk of the sad fate of the Kalahari Conservation Socie- ty. Founded in the early 1980s, the KCS The Yangtze River Dolphin, or Baiji, one off the backs of far more abundant marine soon earned an international reputation of the world’s few freshwater dolphins, cetaceans), the Baiji has become the first in its feisty fights for Botswanan wild- has been declared ‘functionally extinct’ high-profile victim of the ecological assault life. Today the organisation is a shadow by scientists who conducted a thorough on the Yangtze River driven by China’s of its former self, with no international six-week survey of its last known habitats economic expansion. The species was esti- profile to speak of. The board of direc- on the Yangtze River without finding a mated to be 20 million years old, and was tors is dominated by government elite. single individual. Thanks to interminable relatively common until a few decades ago It gets money from De Beers, among foot-dragging by the Chinese authorities when uncontrolled dredging, illegal fishing other eco-unfriendly concerns. and the indifference of major conserva- and hugely increased shipping on the river The co-option option is rather fashion- tion NGOs (who preferred to raise money rapidly forced its numbers down. able in Botswana, it would seem.

noseweek January 2007 35 Wining Tim James

Hot whites

OTHING SCANDALOUS this month except ated Cinderella days, some of the prices – and the opinion- chenin from Perdeberg Win- atedness of a columnist giving ad- ery is justly renowned – and vice, following Mr Nose’s suggestion obligingly available in equally that I should actually try writing satisfying (depending on Nabout wine for a change. White wine is the your tastes) dry and off-dry subject then: something to cool and console versions, with a richer and us over the hot holiday season. more concentrated Reserve Sauvignon blanc gets plenty of atten- available too. tion, so if I merely reveal the Cape’s best Interestingly, in the dec- example, we can move on to less popular ade-plus that chenin has been varieties. The best? Well, my best, anyway: gaining acceptance in grand circles, the maiden vintage (2005) of Oak Valley’s and being accorded the fancy treatment Mountain Reserve – a wine which convinces from viticulturists, winemakers and label me that sauvignon can occasionally produce designers that was previously lavished on something really fine. There might even be a chardonnay, something different has been little still available from the Elgin Valley es- happening to the more augustly reputed tate for R100 – pricey, but better value than Not only has grape. Not to the smart versions, many examples at R75. Horrifyingly, R75 which are generally improving all seems not uncommonly asked for ambitious the time, but there is now a wel- sauvignons these days. Cinders made come cluster of chardonnays with In the bad old days, when winewrit- simpler, more unassuming charm. ers were pushed to discuss chenin blanc, “ They are not fermented or matured in it to the ball, the first cliché we reached for was “the wooden barrels, so the purity of the citrusy Cinderella variety”. A tired but appropri- chardonnay fruit stands out unobscured ate image, for chenin seldom glittered at but she seems (almost unrecognisable to those who’ve been the party, but did much of the work, often persuaded over the years that the smell of incognito, making everything from brandy to be there oak is the smell of chardonnay). Some of to thin, tasteless, cheaply produced “steen”. these unoaked chardonnays are lovely, while Nowadays, not only has Cinders made it to in a range of more easy-going than their classy relatives: the ball, but she seems to be there all over fine for a picnic as well as a white-tablecloth the place in a range of personas, from the meal. De Wetshof’s Bon Vallon was the

charming ingénue (crisp, fresh, simply tasty) personas, from pioneer of the style in the Cape and remains to the grand duchess or the expensively dependably drinkable, but my favourite is overdressed tart (lots of oak and alcohol the charming the Constantia Uitsig – not cheap at R50 and more than a little sugar) in outfits de- from the farm, but worth every cent, and I’m signed to appeal to the harried and hurried almost prepared to guarantee that you will

courtiers charged with selecting the Prince’s ingénue to enjoy it, especially as it comes with a screw- consort. cap rather than a cork, like all of Uitsig’s There are now good chenins across the the grand whites, so that you can be sure it’ll be fresh range. At the (expensive) top are excellent and pristine when you open it. examples of the powerfully rich, wooded Also under screwcap around the same duchess or the “ kind: new label De Morgenzon, Rudera price are two superb and great value wines Robusto, Jean Daneel Signature, Ken For- from Paul Cluver Estate in the cool, appley rester FMC are among the best. (Forrester expensively Elgin Valley. Everyone should drink a good is one of the great chenin impresarios, by Gewürztraminer occasionally (though not the way: from the Noble Late Harvest called overdressed too often, or you get bored and blasé), and simply T, down to the great value cheapie this is a very good and beautifully poised called Petit Chenin, the name promises one, its seriousness packed with rose petal quality). More elegantly restrained than the tart delight. The Cluver Weisser Riesling you blockbusters is the celebrated Spier Private could have twice a week for a year, if you Collection Chenin (R65). were lucky, and not get bored – it’s as far For around R36 the Fleur du Cap version as we get from the insipid, usurping variety is very good value: full-bodied, full-flavoured, that Theuniskraal and Nederburg are still effectively but lightly wooded; unpreten- allowed to miscall Riesling. Now there’s a tiously delicious as well as characterful. And scandal to return to one day; the protection at half that price, still sweetly demure and of a grape that should be sent back to chen- remembering her scorned and unappreci- in’s old place of sooty drudgery.

36 noseweek January 2007 Last Word Harold Strachan

father’s side, Sonny Pillay from Chatsworth. A hand emerges and raises the cricket hat. How do you do? says Sonny. Hey, man, why your eyes seem so funny? says DD. Ex- Mammut cuse me, please, says ON’T-DELAY PILLAY and I always make Sonny, our own fishing tackle, it’s at least and half the sport. I don’t mean we go disappears en- and saw down a suitable bamboo tirely beneath

stick and cure it for a year weighed the surface. The Ddown with bricks in a groove of the corrugat- cricket hat ed iron garage roof, all that mystical stuff, remains I mean we buy all the bits and assemble afloat, them to our personal style of angling. So after a DD finds a perfect quick-taper fibreglass longish

blank for a shad rod in the Cracker Jack Picture: Harold Strachan while Tackle Shack, nicely balanced, and rigs it up with only three runners between tip and reel to keep the front end light, and binds his free-running wooden centrepin reel straight on to the butt end, to save the the head weight of the usual reel clamp. This reel reap- he did make himself, a prime piece of “ beechwood turned on a lathe, 16cm pears exactly diameter and lined with fibre- underneath. I glass. Nimble, fast, with such a I saw on am seeking golf rig and nice light 5 kg line you balls with my can get three casts with a spoon toes, says Sonny, producing into a passing shoal of shad to two the telly a specimen from underwa- with a geared reel. More fish, you see. ter. As new, says he, I just Hey come on man, says he, let’s nip over wipe it clean you see and shine it a bit the road to the Bot Gardens and try her a spaniel with Mister Min so it slides like hell through out with a sinker, why do we have to drag the air, and put it in a small plastic bag amd down to the beach, hey? No, man, say I, sell it for a good price. I have a good reputa- somebody will make a fuss there, they’ll say which had tion here at the Royal Durban. you’re making holes in the canna leaves, Well this lake isn’t entirely artificial, some mama will say you’re going to make a swallowed there’s a genuine spring here, it’s just tidied hole in her toddler’s skull. If we nip across up, that’s all. Some say this is the original Sydenham Road other side the gardens we Currie’s Fountain, Durban’s original water can get in the near entrance to the race a dozen golf supply, and there remains round two sides course, they’re very kind to the public, all of it an original reed-bed, thick thick, tall sorts of folks jog there and walk their dogs and healthy. And as we stand discussing and everybody’s welcome to the great green balls and Sonny’s self-employ there comes from this lung in the middle of the big murky city. As reed-bed a dreadful loud thrashing thump- long as they don’t trespass on the golf course ing noise as in that original King Kong within the race track, of course. they had to movie where the giant gorilla emerges from So we do that, and right down the city the jungle, and before our blinking eyes end on the thick green carpet we try her a ghastly great brown dog appears with out; splendid, splendid, no overwinds from a take him to its huge exposed teeth clamped on some too-heavy tip, a good long cast, but as I am unlucky creature. Spit spit! says Sonny and having my turn ol’ DD glances around to see the vet for the monster spits out a golf ball. His name where the sinker has landed and there close is Mammut, says Sonny, because his mouth by in the artificial lake espies a drowning is XXL extra outsize. Also great big teeth. person. Quick quick! he cries, so I drop the surgery And hair. I got him from a German gentle- rod and we dash across to the golf course, man from New Hanover name of Herr Otto but when we get there it is only to discover Blattschwein. That’s where he got his name. this citizen is not drowning at all, but stand- Ja, say I, I saw on the telly a spaniel which ing chin-deep“ in the water with a distant had swallowed a dozen golf balls and they look in his eyes ’neath the spreading green had to take him to the vet for surgery. No no brim of a cricket hat. DD peers under there no, says Sonny, Mammut here can swallow and cries Hey Sonny, man, what you doing, two dozen and one in his mouth, then when you? To me he says This my cousin on my we get home I give him one large chocolate

noseweek January 2007 37 Smalls

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38 noseweek January 2007