Pat Sidley
I OWN no property, says PWV premier Tokyo Sexwale. What he doesn’t say is that his wife has bought three flats in a large Johannesburg block.
Sexwale recently told a newspaper which raised questions about his new Houghton home: “This house is 60 years old and it’s not even mine. I am renting it. Here is my application for a bond. Go and ask First National Bank. They have my application for a 100 percent bond. I don’t even have the deposit for it.”
This week his spokesman, Ronnie Mamoepa stressed that Sexwale himself had absolutely no property and therefore nothing to declare, adding: “If he is to declare anything (that he owns) he would be the first to do so in the interests of transparency and openness.”
But in a block called Tygerberg, in Berea, there are flats owned by a close corporation called “Sunday Properties”. A search in the Companies Office disclosed that the sole member of the corporation is one Judy Anne Moon. Judy Anne Moon is Mrs Sexwale.
When this was put to Mamoepa, he first said the flats were owned by relatives of Sexwale’s wife.
But shortly afterwards he called back to set the record straight, having spoken to Judy Sexwale.
“Judy was involved in the property long before Tokyo became premier,” said Mamoepa.
The close corporation was set up in 1992 when the flats were purchased. Mamoepa was at pains to stress the distance between Sexwale’s wife’s transactions — which he said were financed by money “bequeathed her by her parents” — and the premier.
However, the Weekly Mail & Guardian has ascertained that Sexwale himself physically handed over the deposits. His wife takes care of the rest of the running of the properties.
Attempts to reach Mrs Sexwale met with no success.