As we revealed in our last posting, we were in court last Friday to defend and maintain our continued occupation of the old Hope & Anchor public house Mornington Crescent, Camden
As expected we lost legal and lawful possession and were ordered to leave the property forthwith by a very unsympathetic Judge. On Monday, the court order was posted on the doors and all around the building - We are still here and are expecting the bailiffs accompanied by the police at any time, most likely early morning.
We Are Now On Full Lockdown
We have put the squat on full lockdown as we intend in finally resisting eviction which is a trademark now of the SHA crew. The lighthearted and those who have no stomach for eviction have left the building, it’s important to emphasize that this crew is hardcore political housing activists fighting and contributing to the London-wide struggle against gentrification.
As you would expect we wait in some 'trepidation' for the bailiffs knock on our door, during the last few days comrades have been and it's understandable, been on edge a wee bit and, we have other things going on at the same time, you can't blame anyone for this when you consider the violence we have endured at the hands of the bailiffs during the course of the last year, and of course, many comrades are only young, having said that we have sufficient numbers to defend and resist eviction and the barricades are good.
Who Owns The Building - I Should Koko
Oliver (Olly) Bengough is a British entrepreneur and media mogul. He is best known for his transformation of the KOKO music venue and is the founder of the broadcasting channel Cin矇moi.
According to Wikipedia, Bengough opened his first bar “Lunasa” in 2000 at the age of 23, transforming a rundown pub into one of the most respected bars along King's Road. A year later, in 2001, Bengough founded the Mint Group, under which he would go on to launch 5 other venues across London.
In 2003, Bengough collaborated with Groove Armada to expand the Lovebox Music Festival from a small monthly club night to a festival handling over 50,000 people per weekend.
Bengough a multi-millionaire, spent in the region of £6,000 to have us slung out onto the street and tried to have the costs awarded against us including a telephone call costing £320, we must also add that we have not been dealing with Bengough directly but with a paid sidekick with a brown nose, this sidekick claims that a leak from our building which backs onto Koko, had initially had been the cause of £6,000 worth of damage, this has now jump to £20,000. We have been presented with no evidence and there is no visible sign of any leak on our side.
Obar Camden Limited is the trading name that Bengough has chosen for Koko and most recently Obar brought a judicial review in respect of a planning permission granted by London Borough of Camden for the conversion of the Hope & Anchor that as we have already said is adjacent to Koko into residential flats, the pub’s then owner, Vidacraft Ltd, also planned to build a three-storey extension and either shops or estate agent’s offices on the ground floor. which led to the High Court quashing the planning permission. Justice Stewart found four out of five grounds in the claim in Obar’s favour, and now Obar own the building proving that we live in the world where dog eats dog.
Posts
