Businessman victim of ‘nasty’ neighbours

Seeks legal action for defamatory Facebook posts

A DURBAN North businessman is seeking legal action against members of a community Facebook page after he was victimised and even accused of running a drug den when he hosted his mother’s birthday party this weekend.

Prevan Naidoo said he had lived at his Glen Ashley property for five years, and had fallen victim to cyberattacks whenever he hosted family events at his house.

“This time it has reached the limit because they have made damning allegations that since I have security on my premises, I operate a drug den and an illegal B&B,” he said.

Naidoo, who hosted a 70th birthday bash for his mother on Saturday night, woke up to a thread of “nasty” comments about him and his property on the Durban North Neighbours Facebook group yesterday morning.

The original complaint on the Facebook page, by a Wendy Gordon, described the “big, white house on the corner of Newport and Marion in Glen Ashley”, saying it was “apparently a party rental house”.

Gordon accused the homeowners of renting out the property for parties and claimed that the noise level emanating from the property at 10pm was “ridiculous”.

She also said parties were constantly hosted there.

In the thread of comments that followed, residents living nearby claimed the house was advertised on Airbnb, while others suggested residents throw eggs, toothpaste and tinned tuna at the cars parked outside the property.

Some Facebook commentators also questioned why the property had armed guards.

One woman, Noleen Trinder-Smith Hendra, said: “Maybe if you report it as a drug den, you might get some response from SAP (SAPS).”

Speaking to The Mercury yesterday, Naidoo said he was particularly perturbed by comments made by ward councillor Heinz De Boer, who “encouraged” the debate that his property was involved in shady activities.

De Boer commented that “this house and several like it are under the spotlight”.

“They are Airbnb places, and as such, amazingly require no special consent, etc. The best option is to call metro police when parties are out of hand or noise levels are like that,” De Boer posted.

However, he yesterday admitted that he had made the comment in error, saying that he confused the property with another house in the area that had been “problematic”.

“I subsequently corrected the error on the page and went on to explain the facts of the matter. Like in all these noise complaint matters, I always advise people to follow the correct and legislated procedure by calling metro police,” he said.

De Boer said despite the noise complaint, “some of the comments on the page were out of order”.

He said the individuals who made such comments and the page administrators should answer for that.

“For my part, I’ve never had any complaints about this house previous to the ones today.

“I had clarified and rectified my comments on the page to reflect the truth of the situation, and if any offence was given then I apologise. It does, however, not detract from the fact that many people in the community seemingly had an issue emanating from the home,” De Boer said.

However, Naidoo said he felt victimised and threatened by those who had commented on the post, adding that he would meet his lawyers today to take action against the false accusations.

“People commented and said that we were loud, the music was too loud, that we are a B&B and even a drug den. Yet, no one approached us on the night about the noise, even our immediate neighbours did not complain,” he said.

Naidoo added that he opted to hire private security for his home after an increase in armed robberies in the area.

On the night of the party, he hired extra security to ensure his guests and their vehicles were safe.