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Nelson Mandela’s Houghton home hosted some of the world’s leading figures while the first democratically elected president was still alive.
After his death, his grandchildren, Ndaba, Mbuso, and Andile Mandela, children to the late Makgatho Mandela, took up residence in the home, where they stayed until last year.
Their reason for leaving? The Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela (NRM) Family Trust stopped paying the utility bills.
Since then, it has been left to rot.
According to TimesLIVE, who took a closer look at the property, it’s owned by Mandela’s company, Iterele Investments. When Mandela died, it was placed in the hands of the executors, including former deputy chief justice Dikgang Moseneke.
The home hasn’t been maintained, with a broken electric gate, sections of the roof missing or sagging, and a crumbling tennis court.
The pavement is littered with rubbish.
When the Sunday Times team visited the house…a man who opened the gate said it was being sold.
“I have come to help Mandela’s grandsons … We have put furniture in storerooms. From last week people have been to see the house.”
Ndaba Mandela is now accusing Moseneke and advocate Wim Trengove, a trustee of the NRM Family Trust, for displacing him and his brother by refusing to pay the bills after they suddenly more than tripled to around R50 000 a month.
Ndaba said the trustees “decided not to pay for lights in order to kick us out”, and it was the trust’s fault that the house was now an eyesore.
“Moseneke brought people to the house without telling the family so they could do an evaluation. The house is worth between R10m and R15m,” Ndaba said.
Trengrove says that the trust has no legal responsibility to contribute to the upkeep of the house, but had continued to do so when the family “implored the trust to help. [That help] has, since March 2017, come to R1,4 million”.
He said the trust stopped paying the bills because they “shot up from about R15,000 per month to about R50,000 per month without any explanation”.
“We stopped paying because we felt that we could not spend R50,000 per month of the trust’s money, for which it had no liability, without any explanation for the inordinately high bills.”
They resumed payment when the bills came back down to their former level.
You can read more about the condition of the house, and the battle between the brothers and the trust, via TimesLIVE.
Not a good look for a property that should be a historic landmark.
[source:timeslive]
