Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma.
- The Gauteng High Court in Pretoria will hear an application for leave to appeal a judgment that declared various lockdown regulations as unconstitutional.
- The matter will be heard in court on Wednesday at 10:00.
- Liberty Fighters Network says it is not intimidated by Dlamini-Zuma’s legal representative, advocate Wim Trengove.
Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma’s “reign as the lockdown dictator will come to an end very soon”, according to the Liberty Fighters Network (LFN) as it prepares to head to court over the constitutionality and validity of the lockdown regulations.
Dlamini-Zuma filed an application for leave to appeal after the court declared various regulations governing Levels 3 and 4 as unconstitutional and invalid.
Her application will be heard in the Gauteng High Court in Pretoria on Wednesday at 10:00.
READ | Dlamini-Zuma asks for leave to appeal lockdown regulations ruling
The high court judgment was handed down on 2 June following an urgent application brought by the LFN.
In a statement released on Tuesday, LFN president Reyno De Beer said although Dlamini-Zuma has called on legal heavyweight advocate Wim Trengove, the LFN does not feel “intimidated”.
“Although LFN respects Trengove as a well-known legal expert to many, it doesn’t feel intimidated by this sudden move of Dlamini-Zuma and have also pulled the assistance of advocate Reg Willis to represent LFN, who is also known to be a good fighter in court.
“LFN believes that Dlamini-Zuma should make peace with the fact that her reign as the lockdown dictator will come to an end very soon and will be remembered as the one in charge who has led government during its three months of human rights violations and tyranny against the people.”
In her leave to appeal the application, Dlamini-Zuma’s lawyers argued that Judge Norman Davis had erred in striking down the disaster regulations on the basis that a number of Level 3 regulations were irrational and unconstitutional.
“The appeal will have a reasonable prospect of success,” it says in court papers.
READ | Lockdown regulations ruling flawed, judgment creates more confusion than clarity, say experts
Her lawyers also argue that applicants did not raise an “irrationality attack against the lockdown regulations generally at all”.
“The applicants accordingly did not raise any valid constitutional attack on the lockdown regulations at all. They did not raise a general irrationality attack. They raised an attack under the Bill of Rights on unidentified regulations.
“The applicants’ failure to raise any valid constitutional attack was not merely a formal defect. It made it impossible for the minister to know what case to meet. She could not defend the rationality of reasonableness of any regulations under attack.”
