In a bizarre turn of events, a little-known, small-town marketing company is in the process of liquidating both the ANC and its KwaZulu-Natal ally, the National Freedom Party (NFP) over unpaid election debts. (Waldo Swiegers/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
In a bizarre turn of events, a little-known, small-town marketing company is in the process of liquidating both the ANC and its KwaZulu-Natal ally, the National Freedom Party (NFP) over unpaid election debts.
Ezulweni Investments (Pty) Ltd secured three writs of execution against the governing party over an unpaid R102 million bill for 30 000 PVC banners the company provided for the ANC’s 2019 election campaign.
The company’s lawyers intend seizing assets from the ANC and will institute liquidation proceedings against the party should the property and possessions it owns not cover the value of the debt, which now stands at R150 million, due to interest charges.
Ezulweni, which is based in Newcastle, has gone to court to liquidate the NFP, a breakaway from the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), over a R13 million loan the party’s leadership took to fund its 2014 election campaign.
The company, which is owned by Renash Ramdas, an entrepreneur with close links to the ANC in the province, and the party’s former Newcastle mayor, Afzal Rehman, has secured three writs of seizure against the ANC over the R102 million he claims the party owes him for printing and installing the banners.
Ramdas is understood to have enjoyed a long-standing business relationship with the KwaZulu-Natal social development department and the provincial legislature through his tent-hire business, Shories Marquees. Liquidation proceedings were initiated against it in November and it is undergoing deregistration for non-compliance.
The company, founded in 2003, specialised in renting marquee tents for provincial government outreach programmes, including departmental imbizos, and to municipalities and departments for disaster management and other activities.
Ramdas is also understood to have developed a close relationship with the NFP’s founder and former Zululand District mayor Zanele Magwaza-Msibi, who led the breakaway from the IFP, and to have loaned the party the R13 million on the basis of this friendship.
However, after the NFP failed to register its candidates for the 2016 local government elections, the party defaulted on the loan, which it had hoped to repay using contributions from councillors’ salaries.
When the NFP defaulted on a second agreement in 2020, and after the death of Magwaza-Msibi in 2021, Ramdas went to court, asking that the party be placed under interim liquidation.
However, an agreement was reached with the NFP and its councillors last March that they would repay R100 000 a month in April and May and a further R500 000 a month from June onwards, until the full amount of R25.6 million was paid off.
They defaulted on the agreement and, in April this year, Ezulweni again served the NFP leadership with a final letter of demand and served individual councillors who had personally committed to pay the debt at last year’s meeting.
The NFP’s financial difficulties are compounded by an ongoing court dispute between two factions, which — along with the failure to submit financial statements — has resulted in the Electoral Commission of South Africa withholding funding allocated to the party for its parliamentary representation.
NFP secretary general Canaan Mdletshe said that they were in the process of trying to reach a settlement with Ezulweni over the debt and that the liquidation process had been suspended.
“As far as we are concerned, the issue of liquidation has been provisionally suspended as we are constantly communicating with the service provider. It’s a matter that we are prioritising,” Mdletshe said.
The NFP had appointed a task team to negotiate with Ezulweni and reach an amicable solution over the debt, which it was not disputing as “the late president acknowledged the debt”.
“The agreement stems back since 2016 and, unfortunately, we were not part of the leadership at the time, which is why we have put this task team in place, so we can be all on par with how exactly we ended up being where we are right now,” he said.
While the NFP is not disputing that it owes Ezulweni, the ANC is, with secretary general Fikile Mbalula describing the claim as “fraud” last week and saying that the party “had taken steps dealing with the matter privately”.
Mbalula said that the ANC was considering laying criminal charges against Ezulweni and was appealing the writ, which was issued on 23 May by the Johannesburg high court for R102 456 000 and interest of 10.25% per annum from 9 May 2019 to 31 August 2020.
The court had found that the verbal agreement between the ANC and Ezulweni was valid, despite claims by the party that it was not.
Molateng Malapane, the lawyer appointed by Mbalula to deal with the matter, said they had begun to exchange pleadings with Ezulweni’s legal team ahead of an appeal date being set by the Supreme Court of Appeal.
They had also appointed a legal firm to conduct a forensic audit, which had been completed in March, and the findings of which would be brought before the court to support the ANC’s case.
“The matter is fast evolving,” Malapane said. “We have an appeal pending at the SCA. We have also filed papers to lead new evidence which has emerged from the recent forensic resort by ENSAfrica which was commissioned by the ANC.”
Malapane said that a decision on whether or not to lay criminal charges had not been taken as yet.
In a letter to the court last year asking that the matter be expedited, Ezulweni lawyer Shafique Sarlie wrote that the company had borrowed money to finance the deal — the banners were printed in Durban and in China — and was unable to pay its creditors.
Sarlie wrote that Ezulweni’s owners had been forced to sell their belongings and were in “dire financial straits arising from the protracted non-payment and satisfaction of the judgment debt”.
“Its directors and shareholders have literally had to sell off many personal assets in order to put food on the table,” Sarlie wrote.
Ramdas did not respond to calls and messages from the M&G.
