Lawyers have often advised that people have a will in the event of their death to make things easier for their partners and the kids they might leave behind. Somehow, celebrated rapper Riky Rick missed that. Now, a legal battle is raging because he died intestate.
The “Boss Zonke” rapper died by suicide in February this year, sending shockwaves across South Africa’s hip-hop universe. Months after, ripples are already forming over his estate because he died without a will (intestate), and he already has children with his partner Bianca Naidoo.
Although she’s often referred to as Riky Rick’s Wife, Bianca and Riky were not legally married but were just live-in lovers. However, having had children for the rapper, aside from her daughter from a previous failed marriage, she believes she’s entitled to Riky Rick’s assets and should be appointed the executrix of his estate.
To ensure that appointment, she had taken the Joburg Master of the High Court and Home Affairs Minister Aaron Motsoaledi to court.
According to the court papers she filed, she and Riky Rick had lived as “partners in a permanent opposite-sex life partnership, with the same or similar characteristics as a marriage after hitting it off on 26 May 2013.”
It remains to be seen who will emerge triumphant at the end of the day.
