A battle is raging between the University of Johannesburg and the Auckland Park Theological Seminary over a bitterly disputed rates and taxes bill and a lease agreement. The dispute began when UJ alleged the seminary had failed to pay the municipality for three years; a total of R76, 700.But the religious institution claimed this was because the university had not sent it the bills - and in fact the seminary had neither received nor paid a municipal bill since signing the lease with the then Rand Afrikaans University (RAU) in 1996 for R700, 000.Thanks to interest and lawyers' fees, the amount owed to UJ ballooned to more than R200, 000.The seminary, the oldest Pentecostal and charismatic theological academy in Africa, went to arbitration over the money, and was ordered to pay the university R76, 700.This the religious institution did, in addition to legal costs.Then the university cancelled the 30-year lease, claiming that, among other things, the seminary had cut down trees and failed to pay its municipal bills.Professor Willem Hattingh, the principal of the seminary, said he had been quite "surprised" when he got a letter from the university demanding R200, 000 for not paying rates and taxes for three years.After the lease was signed in 1996, RAU became UJ and the land occupied by the seminary was sold twice, before being bought back by the university in 2009.Advocate Corlia van der Walt, legal adviser at UJ, said that for three years the university had paid the accounts, "as any responsible owner of a property would in circumstances where its tenant failed to meet its obligations under the lease".However, Hattingh said that since the lease was signed 19 years ago, his organisation had never received any bills or statements regarding unpaid rates and taxes...