The Constitutional Court is mulling separate cases of allegedly discriminatory wills in order to pronounce on the boundaries of freedom of testation.

A Beeld report notes one of the wills apparently excluded adopted children and the other stipulated that only male descendants could inherit.

We reported previously that the SCA ruled, in a 4-1 decision, that a trust created by a donor for the benefit of his children and their descendants did not include two stepchildren adopted by one of his daughters.

The testator, Louis John Druiff, created a trust ‘for the benefit of his children and their descendants’, it said.

One of his daughters, Dulcie Harper, adopted two children. She was in the process of adopting when Druiff died.

In the second case, notes Beeld, a grandparent stipulated in 1902 that only men may inherit his farms and other assets.

One of his sons, Kalvyn de Jager, who died in 2015, had only daughters.

The daughters, Trudene Forword, Annelie Jordaan, Elna Slabber, Kalene Roux and Surina Serfontein, want the court to declare that they may inherit from their father, but their male cousins are claiming title to the assets.

The Constitutional Court heard the cases together and has reserved judgment.

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