The Road Accident Fund’s panel attorneys are back out in the cold after a full Bench of the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria) upheld an appeal by the RAF against the immediate execution of a court order in which its decision to axe the law firms was set aside.

The RAF is appealing against this judgment, but the law firms successfully applied for the immediate execution of the order pending the appeal.

The full court has held that the execution of a court order while an appeal is pending can only be granted in exceptional circumstances. The full court found the trial court erred in finding such exceptional circumstances.

One of the exceptional circumstances found by the court was the perceived chaos and disarray of the civil trial rolls in the courts.

The full court disagreed: ‘One is compelled to observe that some two and a half months after the grant of the review order…the evidence of chaos, disruption and a judicial system in disarray remains scattered, anecdotal and relatively isolated if regard is had to the nature of the disruptions, how they have been managed as well as the volume of cases that are being dealt with.’

The full court also expressed doubt about whether an attorney and client relationship can meaningfully come into existence in the ‘toxic environment’ that had developed in which parties are accusing each other of bad faith.

‘It is clear given the acrimony that has been revealed in this litigation and the manner in which the parties have characterised their lack of trust and confidence in each other that the revival of that relationship under coercion of a court order is likely to create more problems going forward than it is likely to resolve,' the court held.

Judgment