Legal Articles and Guides

The KZN High Court (Pietermaritzburg) judgment in the case of Singh and Another v Mount Edgecombe Country Club Estate Management Association Two (RF) (NPC) and Others, provides a ‘timely’ reminder that no person or body (including a body corporate) can contract themselves out of constitutional or other legal obligations, says constitutional law expert Professor Pierre de Vos.

The Gauteng High Court (Johannesburg) yesterday ordered ANN7 and The New Age owner Mzwanele Manyi to remove social media posts he made against billionaire entrepreneur Magda Wierzycka within 24 hours. Acting Judge Fiona Dippenaar granted an interim order which interdicted Manyi from making‚ publishing‚ retweeting‚ commenting on or sharing defamatory statements against Wierzycka until the case had been heard by the Equality Court, says a TimesLIVE report.

Former Mthatha Judge Duncan Dukada’s widow Hlombekazi Dukada will get half of most of the assets accumulated during their 40-year marriage despite their holding separate estates in terms of their marriage property regime, notes a Saturday Dispatch report. The Eastern Cape High Court (Mthatha) ruled that Dukada and his wife had formed a tacit partnership agreement during 1990 in respect of their family businesses and that they had conducted their growing empire – which included hardware stores, a bookshop, tiling and supermarket franchises – as equal partners until the death of Dukada last year.

Private estates cannot enforce road traffic law or ‘domestic rules’ similar to the curfews and pass laws of the apartheid era‚ the KZN High Court (Pietermaritzburg) has ruled. A TimesLIVE report notes the judgment ended a long-running case brought by Niemesh Singh‚ a resident of Mount Edgecombe Country Club Estate‚ who argued that speed trapping in the estate was unlawful.

Lobby group Gelyke Kanse (Equal Opportunities) is heading for the SCA and may also launch a direct application to the Constitutional Court following its defeat in the High Court. A report in Die Burger notes that Gelyke Kanse wants the court to set aside Stellenbosch University’s language policy stipulating English as the primary language of instruction.

The State Security Agency, having failed to halt distribution of Jacques Pauw’s book, The President’s Keepers, via ‘cease-and-desist’ threats, has opted to pursue the criminal route against the author, notes Daily News. It has opened a criminal case against Pauw and a former member of the agency, believed to be Paul Engelke, named as a source in the book. The Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation had received the docket, Hawks spokesperson Brigadier Hangwani Mulaudzi confirmed, according to Business Day.

Do residents of Cape Town’s informal settlements receive inferior sanitation services to those provided to residents living in wealthier areas? Does this constitute unfair discrimination? On 5 and 6 December 2017, the Equality Court will hear an application from the Social Justice Coalition (SJC) against the City of Cape Town which raises these questions.

The state lined up against Rastafarians and other dagga users in the Constitutional Court yesterday when it heard an appeal against the Western Cape High Court ruling that the laws that banned the private use of dagga in a person's home were unconstitutional, ordering Parliament to revise laws governing the cultivation and private use of dagga within two years.

Police Minister Fikile Mbalula and the King Sabata Dalindyebo municipality in the Eastern Cape have been ordered by the Eastern Cape  High Court (Mthatha) to pay damages of R1 515 000 plus interest for the unlawful arrest and detention of 14 people‚ one of them EFF MP Fana Mokoena, according to a TimesLIVE report.

The Publishers Association of SA (Pasa) says it is likely that the State Security Agency’s (SSA’s) cease-and-desist letter to author Jacques Pauw and NB Publishers – which released Pauw's book The President's Keepers – is the first of its kind to be served on any publisher or author in democratic SA, according to a BusinessLIVE report.

Residents and companies in Lichtenburg and Coligny have averted power cuts courtesy of a settlement reached on the steps of the North West High Court (Mahikeng), says a Beeld report. The settlement with Eskom will see the companies pay their electricity bills directly to the power utility, bypassing the Ditsobotla municipality.

Parents who hit children will no longer be able to plead special defence in court if criminally charged, says a Pretoria News report. Gauteng High Court (Johannesburg) Judge Raylene Keightley has ruled that the defence of reasonable chastisement was not in line with the Constitution and no longer applied in law. The judgment did not create a new offence, as hitting a child – whether your own or someone else’s – has always been assault under the country’s criminal law.

The South African Constitution provides an extensive Bill of Rights protecting the rights of all South Africans. Notwithstanding the fact that the values underlying the Constitution envisage a parent-child relationship as one excluding all forms of violence, South African parents have until recently been allowed to inflict physical harm on their children for disciplinary purposes. After the recent South Gauteng High Court judgment, this is no longer the position. Consequently, children’s underlying democratic values of human dignity, equality and freedom are not allowed to be undermined.

Myrtle Clarke and Julian Stobbs – the so-called ‘dagga couple’ – embroiled in a court fight over legalisation of cannabis‚ want to join a second legal battle. Their case in the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria) has been postponed until next year‚ but this week they filed an application to the Constitutional Court to be admitted as friends of the court in another case, says a TimesLIVE report.

Despite the Constitutional Court’s landmark ruling on the illegality of certain practices in the administration of garnishee orders – made more than a year ago – activists claim that fee-gouging and fraudulent court orders are continuing unabated, according to Business Day. Lisinda Bailey, one of the applicants in the Western Cape High Court case on garnishee orders that was confirmed by the Constitutional Court, says her life was ruined by the irresponsible granting of credit and subsequent garnishees.