Dries’ 70th birthday turned out to be a rather subdued and quiet day. The main reason for that being the news about the valuation of Gabriel which we heard on Friday.
The port customs valued our boat at 100 000€. That, dear friends is about R2 000 000 which would have been a dream were it not so absurd. Hussen, the agent was also shocked and told us that the officials simply looked on the internet and picked the price of the first Wharram catamaran of the same size. That means that we have to pay 5% tax on that ridiculous amount when in fact the selling value of the boat is less than a quarter of that. The bottom line is that we cannot pay that. The funds that we have were given for the ministry and the fact that we have to give it to greedy, corrupt and incompetent officials, make me angry beyond measure. We were told that the next step will be a valuation done by a professional which will of course be carried out by someone appointed by, you guessed correctly…customs! We could then be taken to court if we contested their valuation. We will continue to appeal for a lower amount.
It is very easy to just want to give up when you think about all of it. I have never seen Dries so discouraged and just deflated. At the same time, he encourages me not to become disheartened as God has never deserted us.
Please pray for us to be able to do what we have to do everyday with this hanging over our heads. Dries is busy re-building the box in the centre of the boat. We decided that it will be better to finish that completely before we take the boat out of the water.
We are thankful above all for God’s grace and goodness in Dries’ life to be able to celebrate this milestone birthday. We know that he has been blessed with good health and strength to be able to do all that he is doing. We pray that he will be granted many more years of service in God’s kingdom.
E-posadres: lynettedj@gmail.com
Bank: ABSA, Lynette de Jager, Rekeningnr: 1410142909, Takkode: 632005