Mokwena to appeal High Court decision

Prominent local attorney Tumi Mokwena has appealed Judge Motsaro Semenya’s judgement to strike an urgent application he brought for suspension of a court order to have Tumi Mokwena Incorporated placed under final winding up off the roll with costs in the Limpopo High Court on Friday.
On Tuesday Mokwena said that he had already submitted an appeal to Semenya’s judgement. He did not want to elaborate and only remarked that a date for the appeal to be heard will be announced later.
This follows a court order issued by Judge Frans Kgomo on 12 December that Tumi Mokwena Incorporated be placed under final winding up and costs of the application are costs in the liquidation thereof.
Then Mokwena informed the High Court that he intends to bring an urgent application before court that the ruling of placing the company under final winding up be suspended and/or stayed pending the final determination of the rescission application served and filed by the firm on 17 December. In his application he have submitted that the costs of the application be paid by any of the respondents who may oppose the application and that Mokwena’s firm be granted further or alternative relief.
The matter was before court earlier this month and postponed to Friday for judgement. In Semenya’s judgement she states that the respondents argued that the Master of the High Court was placed in custody and control of the firm’s assets upon the granting of a final winding up order. It was submitted that the Master is therefore a necessary party to the proceedings and should have been joined thereto. “I, however, find that the Master was indeed the custodian and in control of the assets of the applicant as at the date of the launch of this application. The Master is further the regulating authority of all insolvent estates. I am in agreement with respondents’ submission that the Master is a necessary party and that failure to join the Master to the proceedings constitutes a non-joinder,” Semenya said, adding “I am, however, alive to the fact that the provisional liquidators were appointed on 10 January 2020 after the application was launched and could have been joined on that basis.”
Mokwena allegedly also failed to provide proof in the form of an affidavit to indicate that he is a member or director of the firm.
The order of 12 December was issued after a protracted legal battle over alleged unpaid debt with local businessman Sthembiso Bosch.
During previous court sittings Bosch successfully argued that Mokwena had allegedly failed on numerous occasions to honour an agreement for the repayment of debt which was made an order of court involving R1,5 million.
Bosch reportedly paid the money through the Majola Trust of which he is a trustee, into Tumi Mokwena Incorporated’s trust account for a property transaction which reportedly did not materialise and the money seemingly not been returned.

Story: RC Myburgh
>>rc.observer@gmail.com