Photos sent by the museum’s Allan Sinclair, showed cupboards and shelving lying on the floor which, they claim, had been left there without being removed.
After fighting his eviction from the museum, Coleman was left with only two days to remove all stock and shop fittings on 15 October. The eviction has left him, his wife and all of their employees without an income.
Management at the Ditsong Museums of South Africa gave Coleman notice of eviction three years ago and he spent more than R200 000 in legal fees trying to fight it, only to lose the battle and be left with no alternative.
Coleman claims the museum had stated that they would use the shops for extra exhibition space, but allegedly raised Coleman’s hopes that, firstly, a tender would be advertised for both spaces. This never came to fruition. Secondly, he claims he was told that the notice would be extended to January 2016 to allow him time to relocate his business. This also never came to be and he had no choice but to hurriedly evacuate.
Coleman has since responded to the allegation that he maliciously damaged the shop and restaurant spaces and stated categorically that he deemed them to be false. “At the 11th hour, they told me we had to be out on 15 October and no extension was forthcoming. We had very little time to arrange the movers,” replied Coleman.
“We removed all our shop fitting as none of it belongs to the museum and started to remove fittings from the restaurant, which included the awnings.
“The museum staff helped us to dismantle the shop and restaurant. Once we started to pull it out we saw it was rotten in places and decided to leave it. We had fitted the units at our cost with our shop fitter after doing a refit about five years ago.
“So, seeing as we had no time or place to dump it, we left it onsite. What you see in the photos was done by the museum staff, not us.”
Numerous attempts to contact various museum representatives for further comment proved fruitless.
Sinclair was asked to respond to Coleman’s reply to the allegations, and to send a case number if a case of malicious damage to property had been opened with police, but he declined to comment further.
Details: www.warstore.co.za
