Neighbours living in luxury but fighting over lights
● A prominent Knysna property developer is embroiled in a legal spat over a shared electricity connection linking two upmarket apartment blocks in the Garden Route town.
Neil Lurie, who lives in Knysna and develops commercial property countrywide, last week filed a defamation suit against one of his neighbours for alleging he had illegally connected two of his developments to the same electricity supply.
Lurie insists the connection is legal despite concerns shared by a group of owners in one of the developments, The Gallery, in which he owns apartments.
The Gallery is next to The Rex Extension, which Lurie opened two years ago. Lurie developed The Rex Extension with other business partners. He is a listed manager of Johannesburg-based Maponya Developments.
The Gallery apartment owner Wayne Voigt, who first raised concerns about the electricity cable on behalf of a group of owners, said he received a summons for alleged defamation last week.
Correspondence seen by the Sunday Times shows that Voigt also raised his concerns with hotel group AHA, which leases and manages The Rex Extension.
AHA CEO Graeme Edmond said the company would not run the hotel illegally and would assess the situation should the need arise. He said AHA was satisfied with the current temporary certificate that allowed it to trade.
An occupancy certificate is issued by a local municipality to indicate that a building is fully compliant with by-laws.
Knysna municipality said it was investigating the electricity cable connecting the two buildings near Knysna Waterfront Quays.
“The matter has been referred to the municipality’s legal services division to consider the provisions of the by-law and all other relevant information in order to advise the municipal manager,” said spokesperson Nandipha September.
Voigt said The Gallery’s body corporate did not authorise the shared connection — from a bulk supply— when Lurie opened the 56-unit Rex Extension in 2017.
In September, Voigt addressed the matter to a Knysna councillor: “I am yet to find an individual who is willing to provide the same arrangement for the next-door neighbour of their own home. This includes the current trustees of the body corporate of The Gallery.”
Lurie said the municipality authorised the electrical connection. “The method authorised for the distribution of the power from the connection is the most feasible way for the landlord of The Rex Hotel to get a supply to the new building and to utilise the infrastructure which it had already paid the municipality for,” he told the Sunday Times.
“There has been an allegation by Mr Voigt that the by-laws do not allow this, but there is nothing in the by-law which prevents it.
“There is no ‘piggy-backing’ whatsoever. All electrical consumption is separately metered and billed and no-one is paying any portion of any other person’s electrical supply.”
Lurie said the permanent occupancy certificate would be issued soon.