Errol Musk, left, step-daughter Jana Bezuidenhout, centre, and Elon Musk. Photos / Getty Images, AP
Errol Musk, left, step-daughter Jana Bezuidenhout, centre, and Elon Musk. Photos / Getty Images, AP
The baby he fathered by his own step-daughter was as the result of a one-off "mistake", Errol Musk – the South African father of the tech billionaire Elon Musk, has revealed.
The 72-year-old has been accused of bringing "shame on the family" by his ex-wife and mother of Jana Bezuidenhout who is 42 years younger than the wealthy businessman.
Errol disclosed that his sixth child, Elliot Rush, was conceived 'in the heat of the moment' after Jana had been thrown out by her boyfriend.
"I do not want to call it a mistake because no child wants to hear that they were a mistake," he told Rapport newspaper.
Errol Musk says Jana and their son now lived on the same property as him. Photo / Getty Images
"It happened one evening when Jana's boyfriend threw her out of the house and she had slept over at my house. You have to understand – I've been single for 20 years and I'm just a man who makes mistakes."
He said Jana and their son now lived on the same property as him, in Langebaan, an hour outside Cape Town, but they are not in a relationship.
The extraordinary revelation by MailOnline last week offered an explanation for the bitter family feud that has engulfed one of the world's richest families.
Errol was branded "evil" and "a terrible human being" by Elon Musk, the Tesla Motors chief, who said his father had done "almost every evil thing you can possibly think of".
Thirty-year-old Jana's mother, Heidi-Mari Musk described her former husband as "a bad man" who had "ruined everything" for the family.
Errol is pictured here holding his son Elon as a baby. Photo / Supplied
"He has caused an incredible amount of pain for me and his children and now brought shame on the family again. We are furious that he could make his own stepchild pregnant. And that he blows it out for the world.
"We have tried to get peace in our hearts, but he has now ruined everything," she told the newspaper.
Heide, his second wife, was a widow with three young children when she met Errol. Her first husband died in a car crash and Errol helped raise her little ones Jock junior, Jana and Harry.
Errol has a 10-month-old baby boy called Elliot Rush Musk with his stepdaughter Jana Bezuidenhout, 30 (pictured). Photo / Supplied
Errol already had three children of his own from his first marriage to High School sweetheart, the model and socialite Maye Haldeman – Elon, his brother Kimbal and sister Tosca. Errol and Heide had two daughters called Alexandra 'Ali' Musk and Asha 'Rose' Musk.
Asked for his response to Heide's criticism, Errol today said he found it strange that she had lashed out at him, claiming that she begged him to take her back "every month".
Errol was branded 'evil' and 'a terrible human being' by Elon Musk, the Tesla Motors chief. Photo / AP
Elon, the 46-year-old SpaceX founder who has a £20 billion fortune, reportedly went "berserk" when he learned that his step-sister Jana, who lived with him as a youngster, was having his father's child.
The space explorer spared no punches in an interview with American Rolling Stone magazine about his feelings towards his father.
"He was such a terrible human being, you have no idea," he said with tears running down his face.
"My dad will have a carefully thought-out plan of evil. He will plan evil. Almost every crime you can possibly think of, he has done. Almost every evil thing you could possibly think of, he has done. It's so terrible, you can't believe it."
