One of the functions of the Master of the High Court is to compile a panel of suitable candidates to be appointed as liquidators or trustees of insolvent persons and to remove people who are unsuitable. The adding or exclusion of persons from the panel is administrative action for the purposes of the Promotion of
The Department of Home Affairs issued an Immigration Directive which required departmental functionaries to refuse all applications for temporary or permanent residence visas made by the holder of an asylum seeker permit. The court found that the directive was treated as binding by the departmental officials tasked to implement it and it was therefore open
The Constitutional Court re-examined section 7(2) of the Promotion of Administrative Justice Act which creates an obligation on applicants for the court review of an administrative decision to exhaust all internal remedies first. The obligation to exhaust internal remedies should not be rigidly imposed nor used by administrators to frustrate an applicant’s efforts to review
The supreme court of appeal refused to extend the 180 day period for court review proceedings to challenge administrative action by the Free State Gambling and Liquor Authority because there was no reasonably satisfactory or acceptable explanation for the delay. In the absence of any proper explanation for the delay the court refused to grant
Under the correct set of circumstances a party may treat an administrative act as void and await developments, which must not be ‘equated with contumacious disregard for the law by anarchists and legal delinquents’, according to a judgment of the Namibia High Court
The judgment stayed the implementation and application of the provisions of the
The Supreme Court of Appeal decided that a decision by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa to determine gas prices was not reviewable at the stage when NERSA decided on a methodology to determine the prices, but was reviewable when NERSA subsequently determined the prices imposed on customers.
In February 2012, NERSA concluded that
The Constitutional Court has held that the private deliberations of the Judicial Services Commission in exercising its mandate to appoint judges must be disclosed as part of the record of proceedings when a decision is challenged.
The judicial candidates are interviewed in public and this is followed by private deliberations and recommendations to the President
In an important judgment, the Constitutional Court emphasises that fundamental rights are primarily meant to protect human beings against the state. All the rights contained in our Bill of Rights are very much fundamental rights, including the right to just administrative action enshrined in section 33.
South Africa’s administrative law benefits natural and juristic private
The appellants in Pather v Financial Services Board failed in the suggestion that claims against it of contravention of the Security Services Act 2004 should have been proved by the enforcement committee according to the criminal standard, namely beyond reasonable doubt. The court held that the civil standard applies and that the proceedings and penalty
Where a mandatory and material procedure or condition is overlooked when an administrative decision is made, the omission cannot be ignored on the basis that the outcome was inevitable even if the step was taken. No-one can argue that following the correct procedure would have made no difference. It cannot be known with certainty what