Society wife hunts company's secrets

The estranged wife of one of South Africa's richest men is up against one of her husband's former companies in the Constitutional Court.

The woman claims the company is trying to bully her into abandoning a subpoena compelling testimony that she believes would reveal the true extent of her husband's riches.

A 2015 court order bars media organisations from naming the couple in reports on their divorce.

Married in community of property, they have been embroiled in a bitter divorce marked by wrangling over their joint estate since 2012. In June 2012 the wife moved out of their luxury home in Johannesburg and into a luxury hotel in Sandton. Since their separation, she has moved six times and now lives in Cape Town.

They have agreed to the divorce but the division of their joint estates remains contentious.

Last year her R140,000 a month maintenance claim was dismissed by the Johannesburg High Court.

Her lawyer at the time said she needed every month:

• R22,000 for groceries;
• R9,700 for clothing;
• R3,000 for fresh flowers;
• R11,533 for medical aid contributions; and
• R4,000 for entertainment.

Now the businessman's former company has taken his wife to the Constitutional Court in an attempt to stop her accessing confidential company documents.

The woman subpoenaed the company's chartered accountant to get the records. She believes they will expose a money trail from the company to two trusts.

She claimed the trusts, which have a 25% stake in the company, are part of her husband's "alter ego".

In an affidavit submitted to the court, a lawyer for the company, Rael Gootkin, opposed her demands for access to company records.

He said the subpoena was "oppressive and unduly onerous" because it would require the accountant to sift through documents dating back to 1993. He said compliance with the subpoena would infringe on the company's right to privacy and had been issued with "ulterior motives" because the records sought were not relevant to the divorce action.

"The information pertaining to the financial structures . of various investments is highly confidential and if it fell into the hands of industry peers or competitors and/or financiers, it may be harmful to the company," Gootkin said.

In the wife's answering papers, her lawyer, Beverley Clark, said the "fundamental weakness" in the company's argument was that the woman's offer to protect the confidentiality of the documents was rejected.

"The reason for the unwillingness to make the information available ... is precisely that the applicants [the company] know it to be relevant to the divorce proceedings (as conceded by them [in lower courts]) and that the information will promote [her] counterclaim."

This is the company's last hope of barring her from gaining access to its documents. The Johannesburg High Court and the Supreme Court of Appeal have dismissed the company's application for leave to appeal.

Clark said: "It bears mentioning that [my client] does not pursue this litigation by choice but by necessity, in that she has no funds whatsoever under her control."

In November, Johannesburg High Court Acting Judge Daniel Berger ruled that the documents were relevant to the divorce and that the woman "has a right to examine the documents to assess if they can assist her in her claim".

Berger also found that there was no evidence to suggest that the woman issued the subpoena with an "ulterior motive".

He said the key issue was whether the trusts were the alter ego of her husband and could form part of the maintenance claim.

He added: "If she is about to prove that [her husband] used the trusts as his alter ego, it will follow that the trustees allowed themselves to be used by [him]. That will mean that the trustees have acted in breach of their fiduciary duties."

In her papers Clark said the company's application to the court was "opportunistic" and a tactic . to delay the hearing of the divorce action.