Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996 (Act No. 108 of 1996)RulesConstitutional Court Rules, 2003Part VIII : Direct Access and Appeals20. Procedure on appeal |
| (1) | If leave to appeal is given in terms of rule 19, the appellant shall note and prosecute the appeal as follows: |
| (a) | The appellant shall prepare and lodge the appeal record with the Registrar within such time as may be fixed by the Chief Justice in directions. |
| (b) | Subject to the provisions of subrule (1)(c) below, the appeal record shall consist of the judgment of the court from which the appeal is noted, together with all the documentation lodged by the parties in that court and all the evidence which may have been led in the proceedings and which may be relevant to the issues that are to be determined. |
| (c) |
| (i) | The parties shall endeavour to reach agreement on what should be included in the record and, in the absence of such agreement, the appellant shall apply to the Chief Justice for directions to be given in regard to the compilation of the record. |
| (ii) | Such application shall be made in writing and shall set out the nature of the dispute between the parties in regard to the compilation of the record and the reasons for the appellant's contentions. |
| (iii) | The respondent may respond to the application within 10 days of being served with the application and shall set out the reasons for the respondent's contentions. |
| (iv) | The Chief Justice may assign the application to one or more judges, who may deal with the matter on the papers or require the parties to appear before him or her or them on a specified day and at a specified time to debate the compilation of the record. |
| (v) | The judge or judges concerned shall give directions in regard to the compilation of the record, the time within which the record is to be lodged with the Registrar and any other matters which may be deemed by him or her or them to be necessary for the purpose of enabling the Court to deal with the appeal, which directions may include that the matter be referred back to the court a quo for the hearing of additional evidence specified in the directions, or that additional evidence be put before the Court by way of affidavit or otherwise for the purpose of the appeal. |
| (2) |
| (a) | One of the copies of the record lodged with the Registrar shall be certified as correct by the Registrar of the court appealed from. |
| (b) | Copies of the record shall be clearly typed on stout A4-size paper, double-spaced in black record ink, on one side of the paper only. |
| (c) | Legible documents that were typed or printed in their original form such as cheques and the like shall not be retyped and clear photocopies on A4-size paper shall be provided instead. |
| (d) | The pages shall be numbered clearly and consecutively and every tenth line on each page shall be numbered and the pagination used in the court a quo shall be retained where possible. |
| (e) | Bulky records shall be divided into separate conveniently-sized volumes of approximately 100 pages each. The record shall be securely bound in book format to withstand constant use and shall be so bound that upon being used will lie open without manual or other restraint. |
| (f) | All records shall be securely bound in suitable covers disclosing the case number, names of the parties, the volume number and the numbers of the pages contained in that volume, the total number of volumes, the court a quo and the names of the attorneys of the parties. |
| (g) | The binding required by this rule shall be sufficiently secure to ensure the stability of the papers contained within the volume; and where the record consists of more than one volume, the number of each volume and the number of the pages contained in a volume shall appear on the upper third of the spine of the volume. |
| (h) | Where documents are lodged with the Registrar, and such documents are recorded on a computer disk, the party lodging the document shall where possible also make available to the Registrar a disk containing the file in which the document is contained, or transmit an electronic copy of the document concerned by e-mail in a format determined by the Registrar which is compatible with software that is used by the Court at the time of lodgement, to the Registrar at: [email protected]: Provided that the transmission of such copy shall not relieve the party concerned from the obligation under rule 1(3) to lodge the prescribed number of hard copies of the documents so lodged. |
| (i) | If a disk is made available to the Registrar the file will be copied and the disk will be returned to the party concerned. Where a disk or an electronic copy of a document other than a record is provided, the party need lodge only 13 copies of the document concerned with the Registrar. |
| (3) | If a record has been lodged in accordance with the provisions of paragraphs (b) and (c) of subrule (1), the Registrar shall cause a notice to be given to the parties to the appeal requiring- |
| (a) | the appellant to lodge with the Registrar written argument in support of the appeal within a period determined by the Chief Justice and specified in such notice; and |
| (b) | the respondent to lodge with the Registrar written argument in reply to the appellant's argument by a specified date determined by the Chief Justice, which shall be subsequent to the date on which the appellant's argument was served on the respondent. |
| (4) | The appellant may lodge with the Registrar written argument in answer to the respondent's argument within 10 days from the date on which the respondent's argument was served on the appellant. |
| (5) | The Chief Justice may decide whether the appeal shall be dealt with on the basis of written arguments only. |
| (6) | Subject to the provisions of subrule (5), the Chief Justice shall determine the date on which oral argument will be heard, and the Registrar shall within five days of such determination notify all parties to the appeal of the date of the hearing by registered post or facsimile. |