ROME: A Dutch businessman has been ordered to pay US$25 million ($32 million) as an interim payment in a legal scrap involving one of New Zealand’s most luxurious resorts.
The High Court at Auckland has ordered Alexander van Herren, the honorary Dutch consul to Auckland between 1985 and 2012, to pay the sum to his former business partner, Johannesburg-based Michael Kidd.
Mr Kidd claims he got less than US$5 million when the pair severed ties in 1991, while van Heeren allegedly held on to assets worth at least US$47.5 million – including Taupo’s Huka Lodge, Fiji’s Dolphin Island retreat, and 32kg of gold.
Mr Kidd wanted a judge to rule he had an interest in half of these and the partnership’s other assets when they went their separate ways. It is a claim he has chased since 1996 through courts in South Africa and New Zealand.
