Restaurant chain beneficiary loses bid to remove trustees
The SCA has rejected a bid by the young heir to a popular Greek restaurant chain to have the trustees removed from the company, notes a Sunday Times report.
Konstantinos ‘Kostas’ Haitas, sole heir and beneficiary of a trust set up set up by restaurateur Evangelos Haitas – founder of the Plaka and Mezepolis restaurant chain – had sought to remove the trustees as the last shot in a bitter feud that began when his father died in October 2018.
But the court upheld a finding by the Gauteng High Court (Johannesburg) that though the surviving trustees had not functioned ‘optimally in all respects’, there were no grounds to remove them.
Konstantinos alleged trustees were withholding financial statements; argued two more trustees were needed to break any deadlocks in managing the trust; and claimed trustees had paid his father's Panamanian girlfriend and business partner, Sofia Batista, R600 000 in consulting fees but had not maintained him while he was away studying in Amsterdam.
The restaurants have since been placed in business rescue.
This followed a joint application in June after the company claimed it was under no obligation pay salaries due to the Covid-19 lockdown.
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