The institutional nature of the Constitutional Court

The journey towards this decision had several steps and was altered under the final Constitution:

  1. Sensitive to the possibility that the Appellate Division might feel undermined by a new separate court with considerable powers, the negotiators at first proposed that the Appellate Division should remain the final arbiter of all matters that it heard. They suggested, however, that it be precluded from deciding on constitutional matters which would be in the jurisdiction of the Constitutional Court only. In this way, the Constitutional Court would never overrule the Appellate Division because the latter would never hear constitutional cases.
  2. Michael Corbett, Chief Justice of the Appellate Division at the time, did not endorse this proposal, insisting that the Constitutional Court be a chamber of the Appellate Division.  
  3. However, at the meeting on 14 September, the MPNP’s Negotiating Council endorsed the idea of a separate court that would have jurisdiction over all constitutional matters.
  4. The Interim Constitution provided that once a constitutional matter was raised in any other court other than the Constitutional Court, then the proceedings in that court would be suspended and the matter would be referred to the Constitutional Court for determination. 
  5. The Interim Constitution thus established a two track legal system, one track for constitutional cases and the other for non-constitutional issues.
  6. The Constitutional Court found this process cumbersome and inconvenient as often the factual substratum of the constitutional matter had not been established. The Constitutional Court did not want to be a court determining basic factual issues, and was of the view that it would be better to have a decision of another court that could inform their thinking about the matter.
  7. The final Constitution resolved this issue by reforming the hierarchy of the courts. It provides that the Constitutional Court, a specialist court, is at the top of the hierarchy. The old Appellate Division was renamed the Supreme Court of Appeal (the SCA). 
  8. The Constitutional Court would hear only constitutional appeals while the SCA would hear all appeals including constitutional issues, thus granting the SCA the constitutional jurisdiction denied by the Interim Constitution. The Constitutional Court could also function as a court of first instance over some constitutional matters and in certain circumstances.
  9. The final Constitution has been amended to provide that the Constitutional Court is the apex court for all matters and not just constitutional matters.

Whereas the Interim Constitution had left the pre-1994 hierarchy of the courts intact, merely grafting the new Constitutional Court rather awkwardly into a side-branch at the same level as the Appellate Division, the 1996 Constitution established a new, unified hierarchy. What is also created … was a unified legal system, in which it is no longer possible to treat constitutional adjudication as exceptional and something to be avoided.

The Constitutional Court of South Africa

In the special anniversary publication, The Constitutional Court of South Africa: The First Ten Years, 2005

EXPLORE THE ARCHIVE

Audio Visual

President Mandela gives his State of the Nation address in Parliament. Mandela ends his address with the words, “Let us all get down to work”.

“We must construct that people-centred society of freedom in such a manner that it guarantees the political and the human rights of all our citizens.”– President Mandela, extract from State of the Nation Address, 24 May 1994

President Nelson Mandela announces his cabinet. It includes members of the African National Congress, National Party and Inkatha Freedom Party.

“There was pride in serving in the first democratic government in South Africa, and then the additional pride of serving under the iconic leadership of Nelson Mandela … [He] represented the hopes of not just our country, but of oppressed, marginalised and the poor in the world.”– Jay Naidoo, then Minister of RDP housing
“We place our vision of a new constitutional order for South Africa on the table not as conquerors, prescribing to the conquered. We speak as fellow citizens to heal the wounds of the past with the intent of constructing a new order based on justice for all.”– President Nelson Mandela, 10 May 1994