Survé urges 'bank victims' to join class action suit
Sekunjalo Investment Holdings chair Dr Iqbal Survé has called on South Africans who have fallen victim to exorbitant interest rates charged by the country’s financial institutions, and who are suffering because of the repossession of their properties by banks, to join his class-action suit.
A Cape Argus report notes that Survé voiced this call to action during an interview with online discussion platform, Insight Factor, which broadcasts through its Twitter account.
He said those who had lost their homes and cars through repossession, because of unaffordable interest rates on bonds and credit loans, should join the suit being led by Gardee Godrich Attorneys.
By February, more than 6 000 people had joined the proceedings instituted by Survé and 42 others at the Western Cape Equality Court.
The alleged victims are people who were over-billed on interest on their mortgages, while others had their bank accounts arbitrarily terminated due to their purported reputational risk.
Survé said the banks’ racial discriminatory practices had resulted in SA being ranked as the most unequal country in the world.
Meanwhile, a Cape Times report says SA banks want to hold onto the absolute power handed to them by the SCA in Bredenkamp & Others v Standard Bank.
Godrich Gardee, of Gardee Godrich Attorneys, said that the banks were deliberately trying to avoid the matter being ventilated in court by raising arguments based on jurisdiction.
His comment was in reaction to Nedbank’s legal counsel, Advocate Alfred Cockrell SC, who asked Judge Mokgoatji Dolama to dismiss Sekunjalo’s application for interim relief because the Equality Court did not have jurisdiction over the matter.
Cockrell had argued that the Equality Court only had jurisdiction over matters related to hate speech, harassment, and discrimination.
He said Sekunjalo had not presented prima facie evidence when raising such issues in its opening affidavits and during its opening presentations made by Advocate Vuyani Ngalwana SC.
However, Ngalwana rejected Cockrell’s appeal, saying where a complainant brings an application to the Equality Court, but also in the facts that he has pleaded, and seeks the kind of relief that would otherwise have been granted by the High Court, that in itself does not denude the Equality Court of jurisdiction.
Article disclaimer: While we have made every effort to ensure the accuracy of this article, it is not intended to provide final legal advice as facts and situations will differ from case to case, and therefore specific legal advice should be sought with a lawyer.
