The business rescue practitioners of eight Gupta companies have approached the court to liquidate the family’s Oakbay Investments. In the founding affidavit filed with the Gauteng High Court (Johannesburg), Tegeta Exploration and Resources, which has been in business rescue for a year, said it is owed a total of R3.8m by Oakbay Investments, notes BusinessLIVE.

Oakbay, a holding company that is owned and controlled by the Guptas, is not in business rescue.

The amount owed relates to a lease service agreement entered into between Tegeta and Oakbay, initiated in 2013, wherein Oakbay would pay the subsidiary R150 000 a month, excluding VAT, for office space and services. It was agreed the amount would increase by 10% every year.

Oakbay has, however, failed to pay what is due and has not replied to any of the notices demanding payment, joint business practitioner Kurt Knoop said in the affidavit. Meanwhile, Tegeta’s four companies – Optimum Coal Mine, Koornfontein Mines, Optimum Coal Terminal and Shiva Uranium – are all in business rescue and owe their creditors a collective R4bn.

At Optimum and Koornfontein mines, workers have not been paid since October.

Knoop said that, in terms of the Companies Act, Oakbay is deemed unable to pay its debt and is liable to be wound up. In fact, without banking facilities, ‘it is impossible to imagine that the respondent will ever again be able to transact as a business in SA’.

Tegeta and the other Gupta-linked businesses were placed into business rescue a year ago after all their banking facilities were closed and they were unable to transact.

The report notes the rescue process, intended to take three months, has been frustrated by a number of factors, including about 52 legal challenges brought against the practitioners in the past year.

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