The long-running battle over Johannesburg’s iconic Marble Towers has entered a decisive new phase after the City of Johannesburg resumed demolishing illegal structures at the property following a favourable High Court ruling, intensifying its campaign to reclaim the inner city from unsafe and unlawful developments.
Marble Towers, the 32-storey skyscraper on the corner of Jeppe and Von Wielligh streets in the Johannesburg CBD, has become the focal point of the city’s latest law enforcement operation targeting illegal structures, non-compliant buildings and by-law violations. The building, completed in 1973 and once known as the Sanlam Centre, is owned by the Goldenrod Group, a property company linked to Cameroonian businessman Baba Ahmadou Danpullo.
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The dispute began escalating in May when Johannesburg Mayor Dada Morero led a multi-agency operation involving the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department (JMPD), SAPS, Home Affairs, City Power and Joburg Water. During the operation, officials disconnected electricity and water after alleging the building owed the City about R14 million in unpaid rates, taxes, electricity and water. The City also identified numerous container structures and trading stalls erected without approved building plans around the base of the building, describing them as illegal and hazardous.
Goldenrod Group initially secured an urgent court interdict that temporarily halted demolitions while the legal challenge was heard. The owners argued that the City should not proceed with demolishing the structures before the matter had been properly ventilated in court.
Goldenrod Group is a South African property investment and development company that owns a portfolio of commercial, retail and residential properties, particularly in Johannesburg’s inner city. The company is controlled by Cameroonian-born businessman Baba Ahmadou Danpullo, one of Africa’s wealthiest property investors. Danpullo built his fortune through real estate investments across several African countries and has maintained significant holdings in South Africa for decades. In recent years, some of his South African properties have been at the centre of legal disputes involving municipal services, rates and compliance issues, including the high-profile Marble Towers matter in Johannesburg’s CBD.
However, on 28 May, the Johannesburg High Court dismissed the company’s application, finding that the structures had been erected unlawfully and without approved building plans. Judge Leicester Adams ordered the owners to remove the illegal structures within 72 hours, submit compliant building plans within 20 days and ensure that the affected traders were relocated. The court also ruled that the owners could not continue allowing unlawful occupation of the structures.
Despite the court order, city officials said follow-up inspections found that some traders were still operating and that several structures remained occupied in defiance of the judgment. This prompted the City to return to Marble Towers this week with demolition teams and heavy machinery to enforce the order.
Mayor Morero said inspections confirmed that the owners and occupants continued to disregard both the High Court ruling and municipal by-laws.
“Our inspection confirms that the owners and occupants continue to defy both the authority of the Court and the City’s by-laws. Illegal trading continues in areas that the Court ordered must not be occupied or used. The City of Johannesburg cannot tolerate continued contempt of a court order. Those who choose to disregard the rule of law must face the consequences,” Morero said.
The demolitions saw traders scrambling to remove stock while law enforcement officers secured the area. Some traders complained they had not received adequate notice from the building’s management before the operation commenced. City officials, however, insisted they were merely enforcing a valid court order after repeated non-compliance.
The Marble Towers matter has become one of the most high-profile examples of Johannesburg’s broader campaign to tackle unsafe, illegally altered and non-compliant buildings in the inner city. City officials maintain the operation is aimed at improving public safety, restoring order and ensuring compliance with municipal planning and building regulations, while the legal process involving aspects of the property continues.
