Gavin Watson’s BMW fetches R590,000 at auction

Hundreds of bidders — many from car dealerships and logistic companies — attended the auction of assets belonging to several African Global Operations (formerly Bosasa) entities in Krugersdorp, west of Johannesburg, on Wednesday.

The late Gavin Watson’s blue 2016 BMW X5 sold for R590,000.

Soon after buying the car owned by the founder of Bosasa — who died in a car accident two months ago — the bidder left and refused to take interviews.

Another pricey vehicle was a 2016 Mercedes-Benz C250, with 95,640km on the clock, which sold for R255,000.

An assortment of goods are being sold at the auction over three days this week, ranging from an entire copper plant to various commercial properties.

Park Village Auctions and Bidders Choice received the instruction from the appointed liquidators to dispose of assets owned by subsidiaries of African Global/Bosasa in liquidation.

The companies in question are Global Technology Systems, Bosasa Properties, Rodcor, African Global Operations, Watson Corporate Academy, On-IT-1, Bosasa IT, Bosasa Supply Chain Management, Leading Prospect Trading 111, Bosasa Youth Development Centres and Black Rox Security Intelligence Services.

Bidders, some of whom had come from other provinces, including the Eastern Cape, started registering as early as 9am on Wednesday, braving a cold and rainy morning in search of bargain vehicles.

One bidder, who didn’t want to be named, said he simply wanted to own a piece of state-capture history.

“This is historic for our country. Can you imagine driving down the road in a Bosasa vehicle?”

Bosasa  went into voluntary liquidation in February after its banks announced they would close all its accounts due to corruption allegations.

It tried to reverse the liquidation but the Supreme Court of Appeal upheld an appeal by the provisional liquidators to keep the company in voluntary liquidation, which paved the way for its full liquidation.

In a last-ditch effort to stop the auction of millions of rand in assets, African Global Holdings on Tuesday filed papers in the high court in Johannesburg asking to be placed under the supervision of business rescue practitioners. — TimesLIVE