WATCH: Landlord and tenant at war over R10m property

It’s not every day you hear of a black family trying to evict a white tenant from a R10 million property, but this is the new South Africa.

Emilia Vollmer and her 11 family members say they are at their wits’ end after spending R200 000 in legal fees trying to remove Adrian Mitchell from their Hout Bay mansion, who had been staying on the property with the previous owners.

And after kicking him out, a court ordered that the family move out and Mitchell move back in.

Emilia told the Cape Argus: “We took ownership of the home in September and then we started immediately with the eviction. He was already meant to leave, but because he knew the owners were deceased, nobody could force him to leave.

“When we took over the property, we told him to vacate the property and he said he would.”

Mitchell has been a tenant of the property since June last year. According to court papers, he said he had ongoing legal disputes with his previous landlord.

He was forced out of the property on Sunday.

“We have maintained that it was not our intention to evict anyone. We offered him a cottage which is just 15 metres away from our home and he can stay in the property until we can legally evict him,” Emilia says.

“We were asked to leave our property because moving him from the house to the cottage is considered an illegal eviction, although we argued in court that the cottage is part of the property.

An interim court interdict was granted by the Wynberg Magistrates’ Court on Monday.

The magistrate interdicted the family from interfering with Mitchell while he occupies the property until eviction takes place next year.

The Sheriff arrived and told the family to vacate the 3 000m² property, which has a sauna, pool, cottage house and natural spring.

Emilia says: “The legal system has failed us as a family and as landowners; we have been discriminated against.”

In his affidavit, Mitchell stated: “The respondent disrupted my possession of the property on Saturday by invading the property and usurping control of the premises in a hostile and aggressive manner, ultimately dispossessing me of control of the property by forcing me to vacate under threat.”

Hout Bay Ward councillor Roberto Quintas said the City cannot intervene as the courts have already ruled.

Cape Argus