Letter to President on landlords-tenants Bill

What you need to know:

There have also been cases of tenants taking out all their belongings from an apartment, locked the apartment and moved elsewhere without the landlord’s awareness

Mr President, I beg that you do not append your signature on the Landlord-Tenant Bill until amendments are done. Please, do not protect tenants who evade paying rent to landlords. If the Bill is enacted in its current form, landlords will have to ask tenants for a substantial deposit, which will not to be part of the asked rent. That deposit will be the surety against bilking. Mr President, your intervention is required.

There are tenants who do not pay rent and instead move from one landlord to another. Such tenants remove all their belongings from the rented apartment such that by the time a court order is issued by the landlord, the tenant has nothing of value for the landlord to take against the outstanding rent debt. Also court bailiffs are not able to trace such tenants. Besides, court process takes long to be resolved. By the time the case is tabled before a judge, the tenant will have stayed several months in the landlord’s apartment, without paying rent and can escape.

There have also been cases of tenants taking out all their belongings from an apartment, locked the apartment and moved elsewhere without the landlord’s awareness. This causes loss to the landlord.
Landlords’ source of income is from rent. That is the money, which they use to pay for their children’s tuition fees, medical charges, food, bills and etcetera. Landlords should not be denied a faster dispute resolution remedy against errant tenants.