Clive Lazurus: The sale of the Gupta’s State Capture HQ - with many empty bank bags

A lot of empty plastic bank bags were among the expensive bottles of whiskey and boxes of cigars left behind by the Guptas when they fled South Africa. So says Clive Lazarus, the Director of Park Village Auctions (PVA), the house that has sold the infamous Gupta compound where politicians and businessmen entertained lavishly during the State Capture era. The compound’ three properties, numbers 3, 5, and 7 Saxonwold Drive, Sandton, Gauteng, and their contents of furniture and appliances fetched an estimated total of R34,500,000. To date, PVA, on behalf of the Business Rescue Practitioners, has successfully disposed of Gupta-owned assets previously belonging to Confident Concept, Islandsite Investments, Koornfontein Mines, Optimum Coal Mine, Optimum Coal Terminal, The New Age Medial and VR Laser Services, clawing back “maybe in the hundreds of millions,” says Lazarus, adding, however: ”but the Business Rescue Practitioners have sold a lot privately, not through auction. That amount I wouldn't be able to give you, but it's a considerable amount of money. I would presume in the hundreds of millions of rands.” He notes that PVA is “proud” to be involved in many State Capture auctions.Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa’s bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here..Watch here.Listen here.Edited transcript of the interview.Chris SteynThe infamous Gupta compound, or should we say State Xapture HQ has finally been sold. We speak to Clive Lazarus, the director of Park Village Auctions. Welcome Clive.Clive LazarusGood morning Chris, thank you for having us.Chris SteynWell, that compound was valued at over 64 million, but it sold for just over 34 million. What affected the price?Clive LazarusChris, I think this, if you can go back a long period of time, the compound has been vacant for seven years. People were staying in the compound, but Park Village really couldn't get access into the compound. The compound is really three properties, number three, number five, and number seven. Number three is an old property on a lovely piece of land. Number five is an eight-bedroom property, also pretty old. And number seven is an 18 bedroom. A lot of people call it the monstrosity. I mean, it's a 18 bedroom. It was on a very small stand, but took up the bulk of the area. And a lot of neglect has been on that property. No money's been spent on that property. And I mean, there's rumours that the number seven…valued it exceptionally high so that the Guptas could gain access in terms of a high bond on it in order to be able to get that money. But generally speaking, a lot of neglect has happened on the property and no money has been spent on the property over the period of, since 2018.Chris SteynWhat plans do the new buyer have, do you know?Clive LazarusNo, we really don't know exactly. I'm not 100% certain of what they intend to do. And they, funny enough, needed the space from after number 7A. So as I said to you, it's really a lot of a house on a smaller stand. And therefore, they purchased the next door neighbour being 7A. But what really they want to do with it, we really don't know.Chris SteynYou're not able to tell us who bought it, are you?Clive LazarusNo, unfortunately not. We've got a confidentiality agreement and in terms of FICA, we're not able to tell you the purchaser.Chris SteynNow the Guptas entertained very lavishly politicians and businessmen over many years in the mansion. What remnants of that entertainment did they leave behind when they fled?Clive LazarusYeah…what we could see by the fancy bottles of whiskey, cigar boxes, whiskey. Funny enough, there was a lot of plastic bank, empty bags. They had a lavish lifestyle in terms of the way they lived.Chris SteynMm-mm. They took most of the furniture somehow.Clive LazarusYes, were 18 bedrooms. They took a lot out, you know, it isn't, but there still was a considerable amount of furniture and dining room tables, entertainment areas, lounge areas, and bar stools, et cetera. But I presume a lot had been taken out.Chris SteynNow, over the years, you have disposed of the assets of seven Gupta companies. Can you link the, sorry, link, can you list those companies for us, please, Clive?Clive LazarusYeah, Park Village are proud, are happy that we have done that. And we also did the BOSASA disposals for the liquidators and Park Village are very proud to have been chosen as the auctioneer for them. We did the New Age, we did Confident, we did Confident Concepts, we've done valuations…we did Optimum.I'm just trying to think of it, Optimum, Confident, Island Sight, New Age, and think basically, I think that's really, which one? ANN7, yeah, ANN7, and the engineering company.Chris SteynCan you give us an indication of how much money you've been able to claw back through disposing the assets of these seven companies?Clive LazarusYeah, we've done maybe in the hundreds of millions, but the Business Rescue Practitioners have sold a lot privately, not through auction. That amount I wouldn't be able to give you, but it's a considerable amount of money. I would presume in the hundreds of millions of rands.Chris SteynSo what is left now to sell?Clive LazarusThere's really very little. There's a property…a small property, and a tiny rundown property in Morningside Manor. I think the bulk of the assets are sold and there's not much left to dispose of.Chris SteynSo your company alone, your auction house alone, clawed back billions, is that right?Clive LazarusNot billions, I'd say we did a couple of hundred million from terms of the Optimum sale in total. Not even close to five billions.Chris SteynAnd, Clive, could you please give us an indication of which other State Capture linked companies you'll be trying to dispose of next?Clive LazarusYeah.Clive LazarusWe do it on instruction. I think it's a long process before we really get in on the time of legal proceedings until disposal. Like I said, you know, we have done the Watson case and we have been involved in…So we are proud in saying that we do do a lot of the State Capture auctions, but Park Village is involved in a lot of them.Chris SteynClive, I just want to go back to the beginning. Why were the compound properties put up for auction in the first place?Clive LazarusYeah, that's a very good question. I think originally there was a lot of talk about it and the Business Rescue Practitioners wanted to be very transparent in terms of the sale. We wanted to be open and open to the public and we never wanted anyone to say afterwards, I would have paid more. You know, the thing is I would have, could have, should have and et cetera. So as you know, we put the properties up for auction on the 24th of July. And there was interest shown in all three properties. However, at the time of the auction, there was only a bid of number three, Saxonwold…The properties were sold subject to confirmation for a period of 14 days. And we knew in our mind that the deal was not gonna happen on the day of the auction. We really did believe that the sale…where it would really generate up until then. But I think that Business Rescue Practitioners didn't want any fingers pointed saying, well, I would have paid you an X, but I would have paid X plus 100,000, et cetera, et cetera. So once then we received, we only received an offer on number three at that particular stage, I think it was 3.4 million Rand on the auction, which was not approved and we didn't approve it then. We were dealing with a lot of buyers and we put out an invitation to offer that all bidders would have to bid on the same terms and conditions. And then we really came to the genuine part and the bid for the four and a half million rand was exceeded for number three and we got four million, 650,000 rand. For number five, we got 16 and a half million rand. And for number seven, we got 13 and a half million rand. Totalling 34.5 million rand for the three. And as said, then we went to the neighbour's property and concluded a deal there for 6.5 million rand.Chris SteynThank you. Thank you. was Clive Lazarus, the director of Park Village Auction, speaking to BizNews about the sale of the infamous Gupta compound. Thank you very much, Clive. I'm Chris Steyn.Clive LazarusThank you, Chris. Thank you for having us.

Clive Lazurus: The sale of the Gupta’s State Capture HQ - with many empty bank bags

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