Roland Routh

A Walvis Bay woman is fighting tooth and nail to stop a local commercial bank from attaching the residence she and her two minor children called their home for the last five years.

Standard Bank Namibia brought a civil suit in the Windhoek High Court to obtain a judgment against her and her estranged husband.

According to Miriam Katsilwa, her husband had, due to vengefulness, connived with someone in the bank to stop paying the premium to the bank to make life difficult for her and their children.

She further claims the bank knew her husband, Josua Katsilwa, is the one responsible for the instalments of the residence and is employed by Namport.

According to the woman, the bank used to successfully obtain payment from her husband but has “mysteriously” stopped deducting these amounts.

Furthermore, she said, the bank obtained a judgment against her husband but has not obtained a Garnishee order (a court order that allows you to recover the judgment debt from the other party’s bank account or someone else who owes the other party money, for example, rental income) to secure the bank accounts of her estranged husband to pay the premium.

She further said her husband, due to marital problems, moved out of the house – and this is his way to starve her and her minor children.

She is now asking the High Court as the custodian of all minor children to protect her and her children from being thrown out of their house by the bank and her estranged husband, where the money to pay the instalments is available from the bank accounts of the husband.

While she accepts that she entered into a loan agreement with the bank together with her husband for the property, she denied she had an opportunity to read through the loan agreement or to obtain independent legal advice and, therefore, did not have sufficient knowledge.

“The lawyers who dealt with the transactions were supposed to be acting on my behalf as the appointed legal representative, but they were only acting in the interest of the bank,” she lamented.

As a result, she claims, she is not liable for the debt, which arose from the loan and that there is a genuine breach of the obligations of the loan agreement.

The matter will be heard today before Windhoek High Court Judge George Coleman.

Miriam is represented pro bono by Kadhila Amoomo and the bank by Engling, Stritter and Partners.

In the meantime, the judge has authorised her to subpoena her estranged husband to testify and dispensed with his reasonable expenses to appear in court unless he can supply sufficient reasons why he can not. - rrouth@nepc.com.na