About SAFLII
Databases
Search
Terms of Use
RSS Feeds
South Africa: Supreme Court of Appeal
SAFLII
>>
Databases
>>
South Africa: Supreme Court of Appeal
>>
2011
>>
[2011] ZASCA 188
|
|
Body Corporate Croftdene Mall v Ethekwini Municipality (603/2010) [2011] ZASCA 188; [2012] 1 All SA 1 (SCA); 2012 (4) SA 169 (SCA) (10 October 2011)
Links to summary
THE
SUPREME COURT OF APPEAL OF SOUTH AFRICA
JUDGMENT
Case No: 603/2010
In the matter
between:
BODY CORPORATE
CROFTDENE MALL
…...........................................
APPELLANT
and
ETHEKWINI
MUNICIPALITY
….............................................................
RESPONDENT
Neutral citation:
Body Corporate Croftdene Mall v Ethekwini Municipality
(603/2010)
[2011] ZASCA 188
(10 October 2011)
Coram:
Cloete
,
Heher
,
Maya, Cachalia JJA and Plasket AJA
Heard: 8
September 2011
Delivered: 10
October 2011
Summary:
Local
authority –
s 102
of the
Local Government: Municipal Systems
Act 32 of 2000
– whether a local authority may disconnect a
ratepayer’s water and electricity services because of an
outstanding debt
for municipal property rates.
___________________________________________________________
ORDER
On appeal from:
KwaZulu-Natal
High Court, Durban (Hughes-Madondo AJ sitting as court of first
instance):
The appeal is dismissed with
costs, including the costs of two counsel.
___________________________________________________________
JUDGMENT
MAYA JA
(CLOETE, HEHER,
CACHALIA JJA and PLASKET AJA concurring):
[1] The crisp issue in this
appeal is whether s 102 of the Local Government: Municipal Systems
Act 32 of 2000 (the Systems Act)
empowers a local authority to
disconnect a ratepayer’s water and electricity supply because
of an outstanding debt for municipal
rates. The appeal is against a
decision of the KwaZulu-Natal High Court, Durban (Hughes-Madondo AJ)
in which the court dismissed
the appellant’s application for an
interdict barring the respondent from disconnecting water and
electricity services to
a property managed by the appellant. The
appeal is brought with leave granted by the court below.
[2] Most of the relevant
background facts may be gleaned from the respondent’s answering
affidavit and its annexures as the
appellant’s founding
affidavits were cursory at best.
The
appellant is the Body Corporate of Croftdene Mall (the property), a
shopping complex situated on immovable property within the
respondent’s area of jurisdiction. The property was developed
in 1994 by Croftas Holdings (Pty) Ltd which co-owned it with
a
subsidiary close corporation, Croftlark CC. It was initially operated
as a shareblock scheme but was converted,
in
the same year (the precise date is not entirely clear on the papers),
into a sectional title scheme in
terms of the provisions of the
Sectional Titles Act 95 of 1986
.
The appellant would, pursuant to
s 36(1)
of this Act, have come into being at the time of the
conversion.
1
[3] In 1999, the Croftas entities
went into liquidation and their sectional title units in the property
were sold to third parties
during the liquidation process and
thereafter. At that stage the respondent had two accounts in its
books in respect of the property,
one in the name of the appellant
and the other in that of the Croftas company. However, even during
the liquidation process, the
body corporate received statements for
both accounts from the respondent, periodically engaged the latter
with regard to such accounts
and made some payments.
[4] In October 2006, the
respondent consolidated the appellant’s rates account with its
water, electricity and refuse removal
accounts. There does not seem
to have been any objection from the appellant to this step as the
first recorded meeting between
the parties to discuss the appellant’s
account, at which no complaint was raised about the consolidation,
took place only
on 16 July 2008. The appellant was represented by Mr
Samasivan Pillay, its chairman, and its other members, including an
attorney,
Mr Zain Fakrooden, who ran a legal practice at the centre
and also owned two units in the appellant. The respondent was
represented
by Mr Shawn Powdrell and Mr Andre Grundler of AG Body
Corporate Solutions CC, a partner of Voyager Property Management
(Pty) Ltd
which was mandated by the respondent to deal with and
collect outstanding municipal debts.
[5] The proceedings at that
meeting are recorded in Grundler’s email to Powdrell written
after the meeting, on 18 July 2008,
which reads:
‘
I
refer to our joint meeting with owners/trustees of Croftdene Mall
held on 16 July 2008 at the building. In summary we record the
following pertaining to this meeting:
An updated arrears
analysis will be prepared by Council for the body corporate;
Once the body
corporate receives this arrears analysis, they will submit their
requests to Council, in writing, for Council consideration;
The S46 application
which had already been submitted to [the Council’s] attorneys
will be pended until the body corporate’s
submission has been
concluded;
Council can expect
a submission in terms of which the body corporate requests a
write-off of arrears, their indication being down
to R1 million
compared to the total due of some R2 million;
The body corporate
has indicated their concern that the interest and or penalties on
their arrears may exceed the capital amount,
and that the IN DUPLUM
rule may apply. We propose that this be considered by Council;
The body corporate
currently has no cash and levy arrears of only some R60 000. Clearly
NO provision has been made for any amounts
owing to Council;
The body corporate
failed to respond to the letter of demand submitted to them on 22
April 2008, other than their recent approach
to Council;
The meeting
confirmed that the body corporate does not have historical
accounting records or financial statements and that levy
determinations have been made in terms of a crisis management basis.
In our opinion there
are no grounds, other than possibly the in duplum consideration, to
write off this body corporate’s arrears.
This is a commercial
venture, and the meeting itself indicated that these units were
purchased for nominal amounts of between R1
000 and R2 000 per square
meter. This body corporate has failed to follow procedures prescribed
by the
Sectional Titles Act and
further in the meeting with them made
it clear that their intention is not to recover the arrears from
owners on a participation
quota basis, but on some determination
biased against the majority owner. This will only exacerbate future
problems associated
with levy collections and therefore recovery of
the arrears due to Council.’
[6]
Pillay’s
response to the respondent’s updated arrears analysis report (a
full and detailed breakdown of rates, interest
and penalties thereon
levied, commencing with a nil balance in the 1996/1997 year and
showing an outstanding amount of R2 271 336,49
as at 30 June 2008)
sent to him by Grundler on 21 July 2008, came after quite a few
prompts from the latter and several promises
by Pillay to revert with
representations. This was at a meeting held on 4 September 2008. A
write-off of the outstanding balance
was sought by Pillay from the
respondent. Two documents were submitted to the respondent’s
agents in support of this request.
One
2
explained how the arrears arose
and generally attributed this to inexperience on the appellant’s
part. The other document,
a
direct response to Grundler’s analysis, was titled
‘
PROBLEMS
WITH RECONCILIATION OF AMOUNT OWING BY BODY CORPORATE CROFTDENE MALL
I.R.O. RATES’
.
The relevant part reads:
‘
...
Total rates bill as
per schedule excluding penalties and costs for period:
1996/97 to 2005 = R
956, 999
to 2006 = R 165,000
to 2007 =
R
204,000
R 1,329,999
Payments: Capensis
3
up to 04/2007 =
R912,000
Body Corp = [about]
R
245,000
R 1,157,000
Balance outstanding
on rates portion as at 30/04/08 = R172,999
Rest of debt [about]
R1,825,000 is penalty/interest for the period.’
[7] Thereafter, the respondent
duly considered the appellant’s submissions. On 13 October
2008, the respondent’s answer
rejecting the appellant’s
settlement offer and demanding payment of the full debt owing, was
sent to the appellant by email.
This missive elicited no response
from the appellant for several months. On 30 March 2009, Grundler
sent another email to Pillay
and Fakrooden registering his concerns,
inter alia, ‘that the debt owing to the municipality continues
to escalate without
any apparent attempt by the body corporate either
to pay the debt or to enter into a payment arrangement acceptable to
the municipality’.
Grundler advised that the matter had been
referred to the respondent’s attorneys for the appointment of
an administrator
in terms of
s 46
of the
Sectional Titles Act and
attached a further analysis and comments on the debt owing.
[8] Once more, the appellant
ignored this communication. The respondent continued to issue it with
statements of account and it
sporadically made payments which were
insufficient to meet even the charges for electricity, water and
refuse removal services.
In October 2009, a councillor, Mr V. Reddy,
approached the respondent’s City Treasurer, Mr Krish Kumar, on
the appellant’s
behalf. He requested, by email, an urgent
update on the appellant’s account stating that Pillay had
telephoned him and indicated
that ‘they have R1 million which
they can pay now on a bill that’s about 2. something million’.
[9] The respondent was willing to
consider the new offer. Towards that end, a meeting was arranged with
Pillay with a view to accepting
the R1 million offered and demanding
payment of the rest of the debt, standing at R2,7 million, over a
period of six months. However,
it became clear at the meeting that
the appellant did not have R1 million and further had no intention of
imposing appropriate
levies on its members to meet the outstanding
debt. Instead, Pillay again requested a write-off of the debt, which
he did not dispute,
arguing merely that the interest charged thereon
may have exceeded the amount claimed as capital. He requested a
summary of the
debt and a division of the outstanding amount among
the individual owners of the sectional title units.
[10] On 9 November 2009, the
respondent sent Pillay a summary of the total capital debt in the sum
of R1 571 903, 03 and interest
and penalties of R1 129 458 as
requested. The rest of the requests, including the one for a
write-off, were turned down. In mid-October
2009, the property’s
electricity supply had been cut off and sometime during November its
water supply was disconnected.
On 1 December 2009, Pillay called at
the respondent’s offices and requested it to write off the debt
‘out of sympathy
for the [appellant] and its members’.
This plea was refused. Two days later the appellant’s attorneys
addressed a letter
to the respondent making certain offers and making
some vague reference, for the first time, to a dispute. On 11
December 2009,
the appellant launched the present proceedings on an
urgent basis. At that stage, the scheme comprised 37 sectional title
holders
and 35 individual business outlets.
[11] In the court below, as here,
t
he appellant contended mainly that the
respondent was barred from disconnecting the electricity and water
services to the property
because of an alleged dispute between the
parties which the appellant claimed fell within the ambit of s 102(2)
of the Systems
Act. Among various contentions, it disputed the
respondent’s power to consolidate its municipal accounts and to
allocate
the payments made towards its water and electricity charges
to the ‘undifferentiated consolidated historical debt’.
It argued also that the respondent had contravened the
in duplum
rule by charging interest and penalties which exceeded the
capital amount claimed. (An allegation in the founding affidavit in
challenge
to the constitutionality of the provisions of s 102 in so
far as it allows for the interpretation that water and electricity,
which
are essential services, can be disconnected if rates are
allegedly owing, was not pursued.)
[12] Section 102 of the Systems
Act provides:
‘
Accounts
A municipality may–
consolidate any
separate accounts of persons liable for payments to the
municipality;
credit a payment by
such person against any account of that person; and
implement any of
the debt collection and credit control measures provided for in this
Chapter in relation to any arrears on any
of the accounts of such a
person.
(2) Subsection (1)
does not apply where there is a dispute between the municipality and
a person referred to in that subsection
concerning any specific
amount claimed by the municipality from that person.’
[13] The core findings made by
the court below were that: (a) no facts were alleged in the
appellant’s papers to support its
reliance on the
in
duplum
rule; (b)
although a dispute of the nature contemplated in s 102(2) of the
Systems Act existed between the parties,
it
arose only after the appellant’s accounts had been
consolidated,
which
disentitled it from relying on those provisions; and (c) s 68 of the
Durban Extended Powers
Ordinance 18 of 1976
4
(the Ordinance) empowered the
respondent to consolidate the appellant’s accounts and
disconnect the property’s water
and electricity supply as it
had done.
[14] The relevant statutory
framework is extensive but common cause. Section 229 of the
Constitution
5
vests a local authority with the
authority to impose ‘rates on property and surcharges on fees
for services provided by or
on behalf of the municipality’.
This power is regulated by national legislation in the form of the
Local Government: Municipal
Property Rates Act 6 of 2004 (the
Municipal Property Rates Act) s 2(1) of which empowers ‘a
metropolitan or local municipality
... [to] levy a rate on property
in its area’ and s 3(1) of which obliges ‘a council of a
municipality… [to]
adopt a policy consistent with [the] Act on
the levying of rates on rateable property in the municipality’.
6
[15] Chapter 9 of the Systems Act
provides for municipal credit control and debt collection. Section 96
deals with the ‘debt
collection responsibility of
municipalities’ and enjoins a municipality to (a) collect all
money that is due and payable
to it, subject to the Act and any other
applicable legislation; and (b) for that purpose, to adopt, maintain
and implement a credit
control and debt collection policy which is
consistent with its rates and tariff policies and complies with the
provisions of the
Act. Section 97 requires the credit control and
debt collection policy to provide, inter alia, for credit control and
debt collection
procedures and mechanisms, interest on arrears where
appropriate and the termination of services or the restriction of the
provision
of services where payments are in arrears. Section 98(1)
obliges it to adopt by-laws to give effect to such policy, its
implementation
and enforcement. Section 102(1) empowers a
municipality to consolidate any separate accounts of persons liable
for payments to
the municipality, to credit payment by such a person
against any account of that person, and to implement any of the debt
collection
and credit control measures provided for in chapter 9 in
relation to any arrears on any account of such a person.
[16]
In
compliance with these statutory requirements, the respondent, on 28
October 2009, compiled the Credit Control and Debt Collection
Policy
of 2009/2010
(the Policy)
which ‘is designed to provide for credit
control
and debt collection procedures and mechanisms … and to ensure
that the Municipality’s approach to debt recovery
is sensitive,
transparent and is equitably applied throughout the Municipality’s
geographic area’.
The
respondent further adopted by-laws,
the
eThekwini Municipality Credit Control and Debt Collection By-Laws
(the By-Laws).
7
Both the
Policy and the By-Laws were available in the proceedings below and it
is in terms of the above provisions that the respondent
claims to
have acted when it
consolidated
the
appellant’s
accounts and subsequently disconnected the property’s water and
electricity supply.
[17]
The
Policy defines a
‘
consolidated
account’ as ‘a monthly account reflecting municipal
service fees, charges, surcharges on fees, property
rates and other
municipal taxes, levies and duties’. By-Law 2.1 authorises a
municipality,
‘
in
accordance with its Credit Control and Debt Collection Policy,
[to] include
in a single account for a debtor different amounts due and owing to
the Municipality by that debtor regardless of whether
such charges
relate to any one of the accounts or fund without prejudice to its
right to render separate statements of account
for any one or more
than one item for which the same debtor is liable’.
[18] By-Law 5 provides:
‘
Termination
of Services:-
5.1 The Municipality
may, in accordance with its Credit Control and Debt Collection
Policy, these bylaws and the principles of administrative
justice,
unilaterally cut off:-
(1) the supply of
electricity to any premises used for residential purposes; or
(2) the supply of
water, electricity or both to any premises used for any purposes
other than residential purposes, where:-
any amount on the
consolidated bill or any other account for a liquid or liquidated
amount remains outstanding for a period longer
than that specified
in the Credit Control and Debt Collection Policy of the
Municipality’.
The Policy in turn provides that
in the case of monthly accounts, the due date is ‘the monthly
date on which all customers’
accounts become due and payable,
which date shall be 21 days from date of the account.’
[19]
A
municipality’s prerogative to consolidate a ratepayer’s
accounts where appropriate and unilaterally to cut off the
supply of
electricity or water services if the amount reflected in such account
for rates is not paid, is abundantly clear from
these provisions. The
court below misdirected itself by relying on the provisions of both
the Systems Act and the Ordinance in
its reasoning. There is no
conflict between the two statutory regimes but the provisions of the
Systems Act with regard to a municipality’s
credit control and
debt collection measures are nevertheless self-sufficient. It was
therefore unnecessary to invoke those set
out in s 68 of the
Ordinance to supplement s 102 of the Systems Act. And as its counsel
pointed out during argument before us,
the respondent did not rely on
them in any event and defended the case on the sole basis of the
Systems Act.
[20] Section 102(1) of the
Systems Act presents no controversy. The question for determination
is whether the respondent was entitled
in the circumstances of this
case, to terminate the services to the property in order to enforce
payment of arrear rates in view
of the provisions of s 102(2). The
provisions of this section exclude the application of subsec (1)
‘where there is a dispute
between the municipality and a person
referred to in that subsection concerning any specific amount claimed
by the municipality
from that person’. Clause 22 of the Policy
makes provision for dispute resolution. Clause 22.1 thereof requires
a customer
who disputes a municipal account to
submit it in writing to the Chief Financial Officer stating the
reasons therefor and any relevant
facts, information or
representation which the Chief Financial Officer should consider to
resolve it.
But in terms of clause 22.3,
the submission of a dispute ‘shall not stop or defer the
continuation of any legal procedure
already instituted for the
recovery of arrear payment relating to such dispute’.
[21] Neither the Systems Act nor
the Policy defines the term ‘dispute’. Some of the
definitions ascribed to it include
‘controversy, disagreement,
difference of opinion’ etc.
8
This court had occasion to
interpret the word in
Frank
R Thorold (Pty) Ltd v Estate Late Beit
9
and said that a mere claim by one
party that something is or ought to have been the position does not
amount to a dispute: there
must exist two or more parties who are in
controversy with each other in the sense that they are advancing
irreconcilable contentions.
[22] It is, in my view, of
importance that subsec 102(2) of the Systems Act requires that the
dispute must relate to a ‘specific
amount’ claimed by the
municipality. Quite obviously, its objective must be to prevent a
ratepayer from delaying payment
of an account by raising a dispute in
general terms.
The
ratepayer is required to furnish facts that would adequately enable
the municipality to ascertain or identify the disputed item
or items
and the basis for the ratepayer’s objection thereto. If an item
is properly identified and a dispute properly raised,
debt collection
and credit control measures could not be implemented in regard to
that item because of the provisions of the subsection.
But the
measures could be implemented in regard to the balance in arrears;
and they could be implemented in respect of the entire
amount if an
item is not properly identified and a dispute in relation thereto is
not properly raised.
[23]
Whether
a dispute has been properly raised must be a factual enquiry
requiring determination on a case-by-case basis. It is clear
from
clause 22.3 of the Policy referred to above that the dispute must be
raised before the municipality has implemented the enforcement
measures at its disposal.
[24]
It
was not in dispute that no part of the amounts in issue are payable
by any of the appellant’s members as they do not relate
to
rates levied on individual title holders after the middle of 2008.
This is so because from 1 July 2008, with aid of the provisions
of s
10 read with s 92 of the Municipality Property Rates Act,
10
the respondent allocated rates to
individual sectional title units and not on the body corporate.
[25] Further undisputed was the
fact that a consequence of the conversion of the share block scheme
to a sectional title scheme
was that no indebtedness for rates on the
part of the body corporate was carried over because it is standard
conveyancing procedure
and the respondent’s fixed policy to
recover any outstanding rates up to the date of transfer when a
property is transferred
from one party to another including in the
case of conversions of share block to sectional title schemes. Thus
the appellant started
with a clean slate and all rates outstanding
were accumulated during its watch.
[26] The detailed exposition of
the background facts set out above establishes beyond doubt that the
appellant, over a long period,
did not challenge the debt
reconciliation relating to its rates arrears furnished to it by the
respondent or deny its liability
for such arrears. In all its
communications with the respondent’s agents, even after the
property’s services had been
terminated, it merely sought to
have the arrears written off and no more. In fact, Pillay states in
the founding affidavit that
‘the [appellant] has always
acknowledged that some payment is due to the [respondent]’. His
further recordal of an
outstanding balance on the rates portion in
the sum of R172 999 in August 2008, which was not paid, puts the
appellant’s
indebtedness for rates to the respondent beyond any
doubt.
[27] I agree with the finding of
the court below that the appellant cannot rely on the
in duplum
rule. There was no attempt in its papers to show that interest
overtook the capital amount owing at any stage. The rule was not
relied upon at all in the founding affidavits. All that appears from
the record (and that only reflected in an annexure to the
respondent’s answering affidavit) is that breach of the rule
was raised only as a possibility during the 2008 negotiations
for a
write-off of the arrears.
[28] The only discernible
complaint in the appellant’s founding affidavits is that its
account had been impermissibly consolidated
with that of the Croftas
entities which no longer existed and for which it could not be held
liable. But even this complaint is
misguided. The first difficulty is
that the appellant did not prove this allegation in its papers as it
made no attempt to identify
the portion of the debt that it alleged
had been incurred by the Croftas entities. Second, as stated above,
until 30 June 2008, liability for payment of rates
levied upon the property rested solely on it. The respondent had no
legal relationship
with the developer, the liquidators or the
individual sectional title holders and it behoved the appellant to
collect the requisite
funds from these parties and make the necessary
payments itself to the respondent.
[29]
The
simple fact is that the appellant failed to carry out its legal
obligation to impose levies on its members and collect from
them a
sufficient amount to enable it to pay for the relevant municipal
charges and levies.
11
This view is confirmed in terms
in the document referred to above which Pillay submitted to the
respondent on 4 September 2008 as
part of the appellant’s
representations in support for its plea for a write-off (yet another
document surprisingly furnished
to the court below not by its author,
the appellant, but by the respondent) which reads:
‘
RATES
ISSUES – CROFTDENE MALL
BACKGROUND TO
PROBLEMS
…
The Centre was
expanded and modernized [and] … [t]his was completed in
1989/90… All existing shareblock owners had
committed
themselves to purchasing their expanded premises and to take transfer
on sectional title once the Sectional Title register
was opened.
Then came February
1990 – the ANC was unbanned and Nelson Mandela was released.
Rumours of impending disaster and a picture
of doom and gloom was
painted by certain political parties. This uncertainty resulted in
most shareblock owners reneging on their
commitments and not meeting
their levy obligations. Even tenants did the same by not paying
rental. The combination of all of the
above led to the arrear rates,
rentals and bond payments. As a result, the banks foreclosed and
liquidated the company.
The situation did
not improve with the new owners and the new inexperienced Body
Corporate…
Croftas
Shareblock was liquidated in about October 2000 – cannot
understand why the debt was not recovered from liquidators.
Our view
is that the entire debt between 96/97 to Oct. 2000 be written off
.
’
(Emphasis added.)
[30] There clearly exists no
dispute between the parties as contemplated by s 102(2) of the
Systems Act and the court below misdirected
itself in this regard.
The so-called ‘dispute’ belatedly relied on by the
appellant is merely a delaying tactic contrived
to avoid paying the
respondent what is due to it. The requirements for the grant of a
final interdict are trite. The appellant
did not meet them. That is
the end of its case and the appeal must therefore fail.
[31] In the result the following
order issues:
The appeal is dismissed with
costs, including the costs of two counsel.
__________________
MML Maya
Judge of Appeal
APPEARANCES
For Appellant: KJ Kemp SC
Instructed by:
Booysen & Co Inc, Durban
Peyper Attorneys, Bloemfontein.
For Respondents: CG Marnewick SC
(with him V Voormolen)
Instructed by:
Linda Mazibuko & Ass, Durban
Matsepes Inc, Bloemfontein
1
Section
36(1)
of the
Sectional Titles Act 95 of 1986
provides that ‘[w]ith
effect from the date on which any person other than the developer
becomes an owner of a unit in a
[sectional title] scheme, there
shall be deemed to be established for that scheme a body corporate
of which the developer and
such person are members, and every person
who thereafter becomes owner of a unit in that scheme shall be a
member of that body
corporate.’
2
Quoted
below at para 29.
3
An
owner of seven units in the sectional title scheme.
4
The
section reads:
‘
68.
Consolidation of accounts
–
The
Council may include in a single account different classes of charges
or amounts due to it whether or not such charges or amounts
relate
to more than one fund or account and may –
render to the
person concerned a statement of account in respect of all or any
number of the said charges and charge debtor
balances to any one
fund or account;
deem any deposits
payable to the Council in respect of or as security for charges to
be levied by or amount payable to the Council,
to be a consolidated
deposit;
accept a single
consolidated deposit in lieu of the separate deposits payable in
respect of charges affecting two or more funds;
utilise such
consolidated deposits as security for any or all of the charges and
amounts included in the said statement of account;
credit the whole
or any portion of all or any of the said deposits to any fund or
account to which outstanding debtor balances
relating to such
different funds or accounts are charged;
debit such fund or
account temporarily with any interest payable on such deposits;
make reasonable
apportionments before the books for the financial year are closed
between such fund or account and the different
funds or accounts to
which such debtors balances, deposits and interest would have been
respectively credited and debited but
for the provisions of this
subsection;
in accordance with
section 255
of Ordinance No. 25 of 1974, cut off the supply of
electricity or water or both if any amount reflected in the said
account
is not paid as if the said amount related to the supply so
cut off. ‘
5
Constitution
of the Republic of South Africa, 1996.
6
Sections
2 and 3 of the Municipality Property Rates Act.
7
Published
in the Provincial Gazette of KwaZulu-Natal, Municipal Notices No. 47
on 11 December 2008.
8
The
Shorter Oxford English Dictionary 3ed.
9
Frank
R Thorold (Pty) Ltd v Estate Late Beit
[1996] ZASCA 79
;
1996
(4) SA 705
(A) at 708I-709A
.
10
Section
10 of the Municipality Property Rates Act governs the levying of
rates on property in sectional title schemes as well
and provides:
‘
(1) A rate
on property which is subject to a sectional title scheme must be
levied on the individual sectional title units in
the scheme and not
on the property as a whole.
(2)
Subsection (1) must be read subject to section 92.’
Section
92 deals with the liability of bodies corporate of sectional title
schemes and reads:
‘
(1) Section
10 does not apply in respect of rates levied against a valuation
roll or supplementary valuation roll prepared before
the effective
date of the first valuation roll prepared in terms of this Act.
(2) Section 25 does
not affect the liability of a body corporate of a sectional title
scheme to a municipality, nor of the owner
of a sectional title unit
to the body corporate, for property rates levied against a valuation
roll or supplementary valuation
roll prepared before the effective
date of the first valuation roll prepared in terms of this Act.’
11
Section
37
of the
Sectional Titles Act 95 of 1986
obliges a body corporate,
inter alia, to establish an administrative expenses fund for the
payment of rates and taxes and other
local authority charges for the
supply of electric current, water etc. and to require the owners to
make contributions to such
fund for the payment of such services.