On Monday, the court of Appeal annulled the sale of Mr. Patrick Bitature’s prime properties of Protea Hotel (Skyz hotel), Elizabeth Apartments in Kololo, Moyo Close apartments, and Kololo gardens that were advertised by his lender, the Mezzanine Fund in the Daily Monitor Newspaper last month.
This came after Mr. Bitature sought a temporary injunction against the sale of his properties by the South African-based Mezzanine Fund in the court of appeal when the High Court’s Commercial Division dismissed his recourse to halt the auctioning and advertisement of his properties.
The lender Mezzanine Fund was advertising and auctioning the properties to reclaim the 32 million dollar loan lent to Mr. Bitature in 2014 which soared from 10 million dollars in accrued compounded interest and penalties when he failed to pay it back in 2017 until 2019 when the loan term ended.
Olive Najjuma, The Fatboy Show presenter in a review of the situation said this should not relieve Mr. Bitature because a countersuit against the Court of Appeal’s decision could happen consequently.
“There have been countersuits and it won’t be surprising if there is one for this. Because one judge ruled that the properties should be auctioned and then this one is staying. There has to be a countersuit.” she reasoned.
Brenda, a contributor to the show wondered why the Chairperson of Simba Group of Companies was failing to pay back the loan when the payments were to be made in 2017 - 2019 from 2014 when he received it.
Further, she expressed indignation toward Mr. Bitature’s lawyer Fred Muwema, who claimed that his client signed the loan by mistake and that the company was non-existent and therefore operating in the country illegally.
“How can someone who lent you such money not exist? It doesn’t make sense. When you borrow money from someone, you carry out a background check on them before you take their money. So after taking their money, the argument became they are non-existent! In front of national television!” she wondered
Brenda added that as a law student who looked up to Muwema, she was upset by the lawyer's defense saying that he should have provided solutions rather than frustrating the loaner company.
The Fatboy show is hosted by James Onen aka Fatboy, Olive, and Sarah every weekday from 6 am to 10 am on RX Radio.
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