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Answers to your questions

Have a question you would like answered? Email us and we may answer it. The questions here are based on ones from our readers, with identifying information removed.

Is it legal for the Estate Administrators to finalise the deceased estates of my mother and my father concurrently?

The present executor is allowed to finalise the two estates concurrently.

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What can I do about the municipality crediting my rates, in error, to the previous owner of the house?

The municipality has to rectify the issue, but you will likely need to settle the bill pending resolution of the dispute.

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What should I do if I cannot afford to pay my debt to SARS within their timeframe?

SARS would have considered that you had defaulted on your previous payment arrangement. That would have weakened your case to be granted another payment deferment arrangement by SARS.

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I was denied a student visa because my name is on an “internal control list” but I have never even been to South Africa. What can I do?

The simplest route would probably be to get help from an organisation that regularly deals with Home Affairs' dysfunction.

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What can my mother do to get funding for the old age community centre she has started on the municipal plot where she lives?

She could ask the municipality if they could endorse the project and give her official approval for it.

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I got scammed by the lawyer when I tried to buy a property. How can I get my money back?

You can lodge a complaint with the Legal Practice Council and lay criminal charges with the police.

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What should I do to ensure that the lobola I paid for the mother of my child will go to the child if I lost the agreement letter?

You could draw up an affidavit that both you and the mother of your child should sign.

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How can we evict illegal occupiers from my parents' house if my mother's name doesn't appear on the title deed and my dad has run off with another woman?

If your mother and father divorced, they would each be entitled to 50% of the joint estate created by being married in community of property.

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What procedures do I need to take to get citizenship, as my mother is South African but my father is a Lesotho citizen and I was born in Lesotho, though I have been studying in South Africa?

As it is your mother that is South African, not your father, I don’t think they should require a DNA test from your father. However, they might want one from you and your mother.

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What can I do as my ex-wife, with whom I was married in community of property, refuses to sign off on her share of the house?

The divorce order, which is binding on both parties, does not in itself vest ownership in the other spouse, although it does create the right to enforce transfer.

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