The owner of a Spar store in Johannesburg has opened a case of fraud against the company's leadership, saying it deliberately inflated the price of the loss-making store he bought five years ago to make its balance sheet look better.

A Fin24 report notes that the decision by businessman Amaan Sayed to go to the police, marks a ratcheting up of his quarrel with the Spar Group.

It comes after Spar and Sayed failed to find common ground in mediation talks that lasted three months.

The JSE-listed grocery chain has strenuously denied Sayed's claims of wrongdoing, saying the sale of the store in 2018 was a legal commercial transaction like any other.

In fact, Spar said it had tried to help Sayed turn the loss-making business around by contributing to his monthly operating costs.

Sayed, who owns a Spar in Johannesburg and previously ran outlets in Pretoria and Midrand, lodged his complaint with the police earlier this month.

In his affidavit, he alleged that Spar's leadership deliberately inflated the price of the Spar megastore (comprising a SuperSpar and a TOPS liquor store) he bought in 2018.

This lead to ‘fraudulent inflated profits’ for the group. He also argued that the loan used to secure to purchase was ‘fictitious’.

In his affidavit, Sayed said he only realised that the R8m sale agreement was questionable after he read the findings of an independent probe carried out by a law firm last year.

Full report on the Fin24 site