Lobby group AfriForum and Parliament will meet at the High Court in Cape Town on Monday over the Joint Constitutional Review Committee report on amending Section 25 of the Constitution to expropriate land without compensation.
AfriForum is seeking urgent interim relief from the court to, among other things, halt further debate on the committee report by the two houses of Parliament pending the outcome of the judicial review of the committee proceedings.
The first respondent in the court papers is the Constitutional Review Committee Co-Chairperson, Lewis Nzimande. National Assembly Speaker, Baleka Mbete, is the second respondent followed by NCOP Chairperson Thandi Modise who is the third one.
In court papers, AfriForum argues that the exclusion of 180 000 written submissions constitute an infringement of the rights of the public to participate, as provided for in Section 59 of the constitution. It also says process leading to the adopted report was fatally flawed. It wants the debate on the reports which is scheduled for December 4 to be halted. But Parliament argues that AfriForum’s challenge to land reform is pre-emptive and its court application is a gagging order. It further argues that the lobby group’s application is an abuse of process.
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