On 10 September 2024, the High Court dismissed an application for urgent interim relief brought against the City of Cape Town by an incumbent waste management services provider to prevent the award of a new contract to another services provider.
The matter arose from the cancellation by the City of a contract it had with the incumbent, followed by the appointment of a different service provider in terms of a new tender process in which the incumbent unsuccessfully participated. The incumbent approached the court on an urgent basis one month before the expiry of its contract for an interim interdict restraining the City and the newly appointed service provider from implementing the awarded tender, pending the outcome of a review application attacking the regularity of the tender process in terms of administrative law.
The court was required to decide whether the incumbent met the requirements for an interim interdict, which are that:
- the applicant must have a legal right;
- there must be a well-grounded apprehension of irreparable harm to the applicant should the interdict not be granted;
- the balance of convenience must favour the applicant; and
- there must be no adequate alternative remedy for the applicant.
The court explained that the incumbent did not meet these inter-related requirements mainly because the waste management services in question were not related to a time-limited project that would have run its course by the time that the intimated review application was finalised. Rather, the services were ongoing in nature. Accordingly, although the incumbent has a right to just administrative action, that right would not become hollowed out over time. Normal administrative law remedies, such as the setting aside and remittal of the tender process, would be sufficient to vindicate the incumbent’s rights if it was successful at the end of the review application. The incumbent was therefore not at risk of suffering irreparable harm if the interdict was not granted and the balance of convenience did not favour the incumbent.
Having decided that the incumbent did not meet the requirements for an interim interdict, the court dismissed the incumbent’s application but ordered each party to bear its own costs.
The case is Wastewant Waste Management (Pty) Ltd v City of Cape Town and Another (16266/2024) [2024] ZAWCHC 255 (10 September 2024).