A handmade key from Robben Island prison, expected to fetch about R21m at auction, became a hotly contested issue before the Constitutional Court on Tuesday, with the South African Heritage Resources Agency (Sahra) seeking to stop the sale.Responsible for protecting South Africa’s cultural heritage, the agency wants to interdict the sale and prevent 28 other items belonging to Nelson Mandela from being auctioned to foreign buyers in New York.The key is owned by Mandela’s former prison warden Christo Brand. The items set to be sold include Mandela’s personal items and gifts he received.The items were placed on auction by Mandela’s daughter, Dr Makaziwe Mandela, and Brand. The items were set to go under hammer in 2022 by a New York-based auction company, Guernsey’s, for the building of Mandela’s memorial garden in his home village, Qunu, in the Easten Cape, but the auction was halted due to the Sahra litigation. The agency is arguing that some of the items were deemed to be heritage objects. The apex court is the agency’s last resort to stop the auction.Advocate Russell MacWilliam, representing Brand, argued that the key in the litigation was a “handmade” key and had nothing to do with Mandela. He said the agency had failed to argue a case showing the key fell within the ambit of the national estate and should be safeguarded for heritage-preserving purposes. “Mr Brand was advised by another warder that the key was ‘not an official Robben Island prison key’, that it was possibly handmade or forged by an inmate for some or other reason and thus likely confiscated and destroyed (ie, broken in two). At no point in time did Mr Brand use or try the key in the late former president Nelson Mandela’s cell door,” MacWilliam said. Nelson Mandela's former prison cell on Robben Island. (Shelley Christians) He faced questions from the bench that there was misrepresentation in news articles that the key in the auction was a prison cell key for Mandela’s cell, and that is why Brand was paid $9,000 for the exhibition of the key, and its estimated selling price was £1m. MacWilliam accepted the “world” was misled in the marketing process of the auction but argued his client played no part in that and never misrepresented the key to be anything it was not. An annexure to the court papers shows the key was described in an exhibition as the “Robben Island master key”, with Brand writing “handmade” in pen in an apparent attempt to correct the description.Acting justice Tembeka Ngcukaitobi challenged MacWilliam’s submissions that the key on auction had nothing to do with Mandela. He pointed out that Brand signed contracts for the key to be part of items in Mandela-related exhibitions. “His version strikes me as being utterly farfetched because it contradicts the plain facts that he signed two contracts which he was donating for exhibition,” Ngcukaitobi said. “The unique selling point of this key is that this is the key that kept Nelson Mandela unjustly at Robben Island, and your client was the person who opened for him. This is why this thing is selling. He is making a lot of money from this.” MacWilliam said his client cannot be blamed for the misrepresentation of the key. “There is a case of misrepresentation, there is no doubt about that. It is clear as daylight,” he said. While there are questions about the key, MacWilliam contended that the agency had failed to convince the court the key can be deemed a heritage object and could not be auctioned. Advocate Robin Pearse, for the agency, argued that the high court in Pretoria erred in finding the Mandela objects could not be classified as heritage objects, collapsing the case.He argued it was not for the courts to decide if objects were heritage objects, but legally that job was for experts. Pearse said the Supreme Court of Appeal in dismissing the agency’s case also failed to correct the error made by the high court.“That judgment should be corrected by this court,” he argued. He argued that whether the objects were heritage items was not the question before court in seeking to interdict the sale of the items. The agency put it to the court that the objects were deemed heritage objects and sought an interdict of the sale to assess the objects in New York to determine whether they fell within the ambit of heritage objects to be safeguarded and not sold to foreign buyers. The court also quizzed Pearse on whether the regulations on heritage objects were not too broad, as the high court found the regulations could be interpreted to mean anything Mandela touched could be deemed a heritage object. Advocate Richard Buchanan, for Makaziwe, argued the items for sale were of no significant value and could not be deemed heritage objects. Buchanan said an expert confirmed the fact.He argued Makaziwe was not wrong to export the objects for the auction and essentially did not breach any law in doing so, because the items were not heritage objects. However, in reply the agency argued it had the authority to determine the question of whether the objects have any heritage significance — a question they have been unable to answer as they failed in the high court and SCA to get the interdict.The court reserved judgment.Business Day