NCOP must ditch deeply flawed Land Court Bill – IRR
28 September 2022
The Institute of Race Relations (IRR) calls on the National Council of Provinces to turn down the deeply flawed Land Court Bill, approved with record haste by the National Assembly this week.
In its formal submissions, the IRR has shown why the Bill is a direct attack on the independence of the judiciary, and identified the draft law’s multiple deficiencies, including some that render it unconstitutional. This Bill will have a wide-ranging impact, as the Land Court will preside over land disputes and all eviction challenges in urban, semi-urban and rural situations.
Yesterday the National Assembly voted on and passed the Land Court Bill, just a week after having received the Bill from Parliament’s Committee on Justice and Correctional Services.
The IRR has highlighted six major deficiencies:
No proper Socio-Economic Impact Assessment (SEIA) was conducted and made available to the public, even though this is required to legitimize the public participation process;
The Bill requires that judges “must…be representative in terms of race and gender”. This is inconsistent with Section 174 of the Constitution’s requirement that, first and foremost, judges must be “appropriately qualified” people who are “fit and proper” to serve on the Bench. Demographic considerations for the judiciary are, constitutionally, considered as secondary and to be applied in a “broad” manner, which the Bill transgresses;
Two “assessors” may be present in any case and may overrule judges in adjudicating “upon any question of fact”. “Assessors” are appointed through an unspecified process which is left up to the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services in a manner that is inconsistent with the standing requirements for securing judges in an independent judiciary. This undermines the rule of law, the supremacy of which is guaranteed by Section 1(c) of the Constitution. It also makes a mockery of Section 34 of the Constitution, which gives everyone the right to have legal disputes decided by independent and impartial courts or similar tribunals;