EC Group South Africa Divine Inspiration I was commissioned to write an environmental impact assessment report, and have not been paid in two years Cape Town, South Africa
The EC Group South Africa provides luxury property developments and so-called socio-ecologically responsible "sustainable development initiative" projects in Southern Africa. They claim to be "changing the landscape of the Western Cape".
In 2008 my company was commissioned to undertake freshwater ecological (wetlands, rivers) specialist work as part of an environmental impact assessment for one of the EC Group developments, St Helena Villages, on the west coast of the Western Cape Province. I fulfilled the terms of reference, and delivered two reports to the environmental assessment practitioner on the project team.
I was paid for the first report, but my invoice sent to the client for the second report remains unpaid after more than two years.
Persistent phone calls to the company have yielded no results, and I have been told that the particular company responsible for the project, Divine Inspiration (ha!), has no money to pay consultants. There is no money in the project, and the project itself has no financial backing.
My company is small, and cannot be expected to financially support a large, international company! I do not have the time or the money to pursue this legally, although I have paid an attorney to send a lawyers letter to the company, which was ignored.
The EC Group should be barred from trading in Southern Africa! There developments are not environmentally sustainable, not are they financially sustainable.