Case Law[2025] ZAWCHC 302South Africa
Kumalo and Others v Mphono and Others (Appeal) (A252/2023) [2025] ZAWCHC 302 (20 June 2025)
High Court of South Africa (Western Cape Division)
20 June 2025
Headnotes
to have failed to comply with the March 2020 order, that the March 2020 order required the Respondents to apply to this Court, on the same papers duly supplemented, for an order dismissing the Main application.
Judgment
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# South Africa: Western Cape High Court, Cape Town
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## Kumalo and Others v Mphono and Others (Appeal) (A252/2023) [2025] ZAWCHC 302 (20 June 2025)
Kumalo and Others v Mphono and Others (Appeal) (A252/2023) [2025] ZAWCHC 302 (20 June 2025)
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sino date 20 June 2025
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Policy
IN
THE HIGH COURT OF SOUTH AFRICA
(WESTERN
CAPE DIVISION, CAPE TOWN)
The Hon Ms Justice T
Ndita
The Hon Mr Justice MI
Samela
The Hon Ms Justice D S
Kusevitsky
CASE
NUMBER: A252/2023
In
the matter between:
THEMBISILE
NONHLANHLA KUMALO
1
ST
Appellant
JABULANI
KUMALO
2
ND
Appellant
SIBUSISO
ODWA MAGADLELA
3
RD
Appellant
BUSISIWE
MPHONO
4
th
Appellant
THAMSANQA
RINI
5
TH
Appellant
T[...]
F[...]
6
TH
Appellant
T[...]
L[...] M[...]
7
TH
Appellant
T[...]
M[...]
(In
her capacity as guardian of T[...] A[...] M[...])
8
TH
Appellant
and
NTOMBIZODWA
EMELDA MPHONO
1
ST
Respondent
MASTER
OF THE HIGH COURT
2
ND
Respondent
THEMBALETHU
KUMALO
3
RD
Respondent
JUDGMENT DELIVERED
ELECTRONICALLY ON 20 JUNE 2025
KUSEVITSKY,
J (NDITA and SAMELA JJ concurring):
Introduction
[1]
The crux of this appeal centres around an order
granted
via
a
Chamber book application to compel discovery and the consequent
orders granted pursuant thereto.
[2]
The litigation history which forms the basis of
this appeal is, to a degree, unfortunate. I set out a brief history.
During July
2019, the Appellants applied for an urgent application
for the removal of the First Respondent as executrix of the estate of
the
late Daniel Khumalo (“the father/the deceased”). The
First Respondent (“the executrix’) is the mother of
the
First to Fifth Appellants and the wife of the late Daniel Khumalo.
The sixth and seventh Appellants, also siblings and children
of the
deceased, are minors and are represented by their mother, the Eighth
Appellant. The Third Respondent is also the son of
the First
Respondent and the deceased and the sibling of the First to Seventh
Appellants. I will refer to the First and Third Respondents
as “the
Respondents” since no relief is sought against the Master of
the High Court, the Second Respondent herein.
[3]
At the centre of the dispute, and to the extent
that it is relevant to this appeal, is the the control of the
deceased’s minibus
taxi business and its operations. On 24 July
2019, the Appellants brought an urgent applicant for the removal of
the executrix
and pending the determination thereof, sought an order
prohibiting her from making any distributions whilst the main
application
was pending (“the main application”).
[4]
On 30 July 2019 (“the July 2019 order”),
Davis AJ granted an interim order
inter
alia
prohibiting the First Respondent
from making any distributions or awards of any assets in the estate
pending the determination of
the matter, save in connection with the
running of the taxi business of the deceased’s estate. Part B
of the application
was postponed for hearing to 8 August 2019.
[5]
On 8 August 2019, the First Appellant on behalf of
all of the Appellants in their replying papers in the main
application, sought
a referral of the matter to oral evidence on one
narrow issue as to whether the executrix was indeed married to their
father at
the time of his death.
[6]
On
24 February 2020, Davis J made an order,
inter
alia
,
postponing the main application to 16 March 2020. The record shows
that on 1 March 2020,
[1]
an
urgent application to compel discovery in terms of Rule 35(7) was
launched by First and Third Respondents directing the First
Appellant
to produce for inspection
inter
alia
all
accounting records in respect of income generated from the taxi
business of the deceased (“the application to compel”).
Paragraph 3 of the application also provided that in the event that
the First Appellant failed to comply, then ‘
the
First and Third Respondents may apply on the same papers duly
supplemented where necessary, for an order dismissing the Applicants’
application
[2]
and
granting judgment in favour of the Respondents as prayed for in the
First Respondent’s answering affidavit’
[3]
’
.
It is evident that same was served on the Appellants’ Attorney,
B Xulu & Partners Inc. (“BXI”), on 4 March
2020. The
relief sought was as follows:
“
1.
Condoning the applicant’s failure to comply and dispense with
the forms, Service and time limits prescribed provided for
in the
Uniform Rules of this Court, and granting leave for this matter to be
dealt with as a matter of urgency;
2. Directing that the
First Applicant produce for inspection and make available to the
Respondents all accounting records in respect
of income granted from
the taxi business of the late Mpumelelo Daniel Khumalo from 25 March
2018 together with her personal bank
statements from 23 March 2018,
including February 2020, within five days of delivery of this order;
3. Ordering that, in the
event that the First Applicant fails to comply with paragraph 1
above, the First and Third Respondents
may apply to this Honourable
Court, on the same papers, duly supplemented where necessary, for an
Order in terms of;
3.1 Dismissing the
Applicants’ application;
3.2 Judgment be granted
in favour of the Respondents as prayed for in the First Respondent’s
Answering Affidavit;
…”
[7]
The
record shows that a further order was made by Davis J on 19 March
2020
[4]
(“the
March 2020 order”),
via
Chamber
Book, where the First Appellant was directed to produce for
inspection within 5 days, copies of her bank statements as well
as
the financial records of the taxi business. It further directed that
a failure to produce for inspection such copies to assess
the income
and expenditure generated therefrom by First Appellant, that the
Appellants’ claim in the main application would
be struck
out
[5]
; that judgment would be
granted in favour of First Respondent; and the dismissal of
Applicant’s motion with costs in the
main application
[6]
.
[8]
What is gleaned from the papers is that annexure
TK3 refers to an order made by Davis J on 24 February 2020 postponing
the main
application to 16 March 2020 and that on 19 March 2020,
Davis J granted the application to compel. In summary, this order
required
the First Appellant to provide the executrix with copies of
her bank statements and financial records of the taxi business
operated
by her on behalf of the estate, within five days of the
order being granted.
[9]
It
is common cause that the March 2020 was only served on the First
Appellant some two years later on 7 April 2022. No reason for
the
delay of the service thereof was advanced. On 17 June 2022, the
executrix made application for the dismissal and/or striking
out of
the main application, on the basis that the First Appellant had not
complied with the March 2020 order (“the striking
out
application”).
[7]
[10]
It is common cause that the application to strike
was removed from the roll on 26 August 2022 some two days after the
First Appellant
had complied with the March 2020 order. Numerous
correspondence between the parties followed in order to obtain
clarity on the
striking out application. The First Respondent’s
attorneys of record eventually indicated that their view was that the
main
application had been automatically dismissed by virtue of the
March 2020 order and therefore there was no need to bring an
application
for that relief. This prompted the application before the
court
a quo
.
Court
a quo
[11]
The relief sought in the notice of motion
inter
alia
is as follows:
“
1.
That it be declared that the Application launched by the First to
Eighth Respondents under the aforementioned case number, on
24 July
2019 (“the main application”) was not dismissed on (or
after) 24 March 2019 by virtue of the provisions of
paragraph 2 of
the order of this court dated 19 March 2020, a copy of which is
annexed to the founding affidavit filed in support
hereof and marked
“TK1” (“the March 2020 order”).
2. That in the
alternative to the relief sought in 1 above, an order that it is
declared, in the event that the Applicants
are held to have failed to
comply with the March 2020 order, that the March 2020 order required
the Respondents to apply to this
Court, on the same papers duly
supplemented, for an order dismissing the Main application.
3. That, in the
event of the Honourable Court granting the order(s) in 1 or 2 above,
directing the Main Application under
the above case number be
referred to the hearing of oral evidence for the determination of the
issue as to whether the First Respondent
was married to the late
Daniel Khumalo at the time of his death. In respect of that referral
to oral evidence:
…
…”
[12]
Before the court
a
quo
, the
Appellants argued that the March 2020 Order could not, as a matter of
law, have simply dismissed the main Application without
a further
order of the Court. During that hearing, it appeared that the
manner in which the Appellants relief was formulated
was an issue for
the presiding officer in that the Respondents contended that it would
have been proper for the relief sought to
have been brought under the
ambit of Rule 42 of the Uniform Rules of Court.
[13]
The Appellants, in response
to that technical objection, then moved for an amendment in terms of
which the notice of motion was
amended to include alternative relief
that the March 2020 Order be varied in terms of Rule 42 to include a
provision that the Main
Application could be dismissed only after a
further order of the Court. The Court a
quo
did not immediately
rule on that amendment and reserved judgment.
[14]
The Appellants seemingly in
an abundance of caution, filed a formal application for an amendment
on 24 July 2023 which was launched
before any order in respect of the
matter was handed down. That formal application sought an
amendment
on the same basis and in the same terms as that which was
subsequently sought.
[15]
The amended notice of motion
reads as follows:
“
1.
That it be declared that the Application launched by the First to
Eighth Respondents under the aforementioned case number, on
24 July
2019 (“the main application”) was not dismissed on (or
after) 24 March 2019 by virtue of the provisions of
paragraph 2 of
the order of this court dated 19 March 2020, a copy of which is
annexed to the founding affidavit filed in support
hereof and marked
“TK1” (“the March 2020 order”).
2. That in the
alternative to the relief sought in 1 above, the March 2020 order is
varied in terms of Rule 42(1)(a) and (b),
having been granted in
error-
By
the addition of the following after the words: “within 5 (Five)
days”:
“
After
service of this order on the First Applicant’s attorneys”
By the substitution of
paragraph 2 which reads:
2 “In the event
that the First Applicant fails to comply with paragraph 1 above, the
First and Third Respondents may apply
to this Honourable Court on the
same papers, duly supplemented where necessary, for an order:
2.1
Dismissing the Applicants’ application;
2.2
Granting judgment in favour of the Respondents as prayed for in the
First Respondent’s
Answering Affidavit; and
2.3
Costs of suit
3. …”
[16]
On 27 July 2023, the court
made an order in the following terms:
“
1.
Declaration relief sought is dismissed.
2.
Application for the late amendment is dismissed
3.
Cost on a party to party scale.”
[17]
I am in agreement with Mr
van Reenen, counsel for the Appellants, who contends that the order
is not a model of clarity and must
mean that the application before
the Court
a
quo
was
dismissed; so too the application for the late amendment and the
Appellants were ordered to pay the Respondents’ costs
on a
party and party scale.
[18]
Pursuant to a request
for Reasons, a summary of the reasons advanced by Nthambeleni AJ are
as follows:
a.
Once a Court makes a ruling or grants an order it
is
functus officio
and
the remedies available to a party are to appeal the order or seek its
rescission or variation in terms of the Rules of Court
or common law.
b.
The Court
a quo
was confronted
with an
application which was not a rescission application or a variation
application but a declaratory order that was “
couched
”
in a form to vary the terms of the March 2020
Order.
c.
A “
belated
”
amendment was sought of the notice of motion to
“
incorporate the substance of what
is Rule 42(1)(a) and (b)”
but
held that
“
no case whatsoever was
advanced to justify the court granting the order in terms of the
amended notice of motion …”
.
d.
The jurisdictional requirements of Rule 42(1)(a)
and (b) were not canvassed or met.
[19]
Thus the findings of
the Court a
quo
as advanced by the
Appellants were essentially that the manner in which the relief was
framed was incorrect in that the amendment
which sought to deal with
a basis to grant relief in terms of Rule 42 (in the alternative), was
not competent for the Court a
quo
to grant.
[20]
In sum, the
Appellants argue that they were criticised for not bringing relief in
terms of Rule 42 but when attempts were made to
invoke that Rule, the
Court
a quo
did not permit the
Appellants to do so. In addition, the Court
a
quo
simply
failed to deal with the entirety of the relief sought by the
Appellants in their application, that being a referral to oral
evidence and variation of an interim order.
Appellants’
submission
[21]
The record does not
contain the grounds for appeal. However, the submissions advanced by
Mr Van Reenen in the Appellants’
Heads of argument averred that
the Court a
quo
erred in dismissing
the request for a declaratory order on the following basis:
22.1
The March 2020 order contains no provisions or words to the effect
that “
the Main Application is dismissed
” or words
to that effect.
22.2
The Main Application could only be dismissed if the Court
had
determined whether there had been compliance with the March 2020
order. No such application had been considered by the Court;
22.3
The March 2020 order made no provision as to how compliance
would be
determined, by whom, or when the 5-day period to comply with same
commenced;
22.4
A failure of the First Appellant to comply with the March
2020 order
could never result in the Second to Eight Appellants’
applications being dismissed; and
22.5
The First Appellant had in any event explained why she had
failed to
comply timeously with the March 2020 order.
Respondents’
submissions
[22]
The
Respondents contend that the relief that the Appellants sought had
morphed from declaratory relief into that of a rescission
application. The Respondents also contend that the Appellants
ostensibly made an about-turn at the Court a
quo
calling
for it to interpret paragraph 2 of the March 2020 order. They contend
that the Court a
quo
was
not asked to determine the validity or otherwise of the March 2020,
or to decide whether it was granted in error or not. In
support for
this contention, they aver that the Appellants conceded this point in
their founding affidavit
[8]
.
Although not cited correctly, as a basis for their contention, they
rely on the following submission in their heads of argument
as
follows: “…
that
it is unnecessary to determine whether the order was properly granted
or not. [sic] Submit however that it is unnecessary to
do so, as
should the Court grant the declaratory order, it would render the
issue of the legitimacy of the order moot
”
.
Discussion
[23]
In my view, this is a mischaracterization of
one of the Appellants’ grounds of appeal. The First Appellant
opined that it
would be impossible to unravel the events that led to
the granting of the March 2020 order and not determine whether the
order
was properly granted or not. They suggested that one need not,
in essence, attempt to unscramble the egg in the event that the court
a quo
simply
granted the declaratory order and in that event, it would render the
issue of the legitimacy of the March 2020 order moot.
Of course, if
that was indeed done by the court a
quo
,
then that would have been the end of the matter. I am therefore not
in agreement with the Respondents’ contention that this
issue
was conceded by the Appellants in their founding affidavit.
[24]
It is common cause that a myriad of orders was
sought and granted in this matter. In the founding affidavit, the
Appellants contend
that on the First Respondent’s own version,
it was impossible for the First Appellant to comply with the March
2020 order
by 26 March 2020 as the order was only served on BXI on 7
April 2022. It would therefore be illogical, they argued, to
interpret
the March 2020 order to mean that the main application was
ipso facto
dismissed
on 26 March 2020, when a copy of the Order granted, and not served,
was only served some two years later.
[25]
The Respondents in their answering affidavit
concede that court orders become effective upon proper service on the
affected parties.
They agree that on a proper interpretation of the
March 2020 Order, that the Appellants, when compelled, had to
discover the financial
statements within 5 (five) days of
service
of the order. They argue that the First Appellant
became aware of the March 2020 order on 4 August 2022 and wilfully
disregarded
the order and decided to belatedly comply within 20 days
of becoming aware of the order. They argue that it is clear that
there
was proper service of the March 2020 on the Appellants and that
the main application was accordingly summarily dismissed as at 11
April 2022, five days after service of the order.
[26]
It
is common cause that the March 2020 order was obtained
via
Chamber
Book application. Indeed, it is not unusual for applications such as
these to be brought in this manner. The Cape Practice
Directives
[9]
sets
out which matters may be brought through the Chamber Book and there
are obvious advantages for adopting this procedure; expediency
and
cost being the overarching factors. In applications to compel, the
requisite prayers that follow these types of application
invariably
would be for the defaulting party to produce the requested
information or document within a prescribed time, from date
of
service of the order, failing which the applicant, on papers duly
supplemented in due course if the case may be, would, in the
event of
non-compliance, be entitled to make application for the said action
or application to be dismissed as the case may be.
[27]
Furthermore, the period for the running of the
dies
starts
from the date of
service
of
the order, and not from the date that the order is granted. The
consequences of the latter are self-evident – in the event
of a
delay in the issuing of the order, a respondent might be in default
through no fault of his or her doing.
[28]
In
casu
,
the March 2020 order directed the First Appellant to produce the
requested documents for inspection “
within
5 (Five) days
”
. It is silent as
to when this period was meant to begin. Put differently, the order
neither tells the First Appellant to produce
the said documents
within five days from date of the order, nor to produce the documents
within five days of the date of
service
the order.
[29]
The
Respondents aver that the March 2020 order was indeed served on the
First Appellant, albeit two years later and that because
there was
non compliance within the requisite
dies
of
five days, that the Appellants are
ipso
facto
barred
and the main application summarily dismissed. Thus, clearly realising
the deficiencies in the order, the March 2020 order
was served on
First Appellant’s legal representative on 7 April 2022 some two
years after the order was granted. No explanation
for the delay was
advanced. On 17 June 2022, the First Respondent made an application
for the dismissal and/or striking out of
the Main application.
According to a letter
[10]
directed
to the First Respondent’s legal representatives, the First
Appellant only became aware of the March 2020 order when
the
application to strike-out, set down for 29 August 2022, was served on
the First Appellant. The First Appellant complied with
the March 2020
order on 24 August 2022. On the 26
th
August
2022, the application to strike was removed from the roll.
[30]
There
seems to be a dispute as to when the March order was served on the
First Appellant’s legal Representative. On the First
Respondent’s version, the March 2020 was served on BXI on 7
April 2022.
[11]
Alternatively,
First Appellant became aware of it on 4 August 2022 when the striking
application was served and only complied with
the order 20 days after
becoming aware of the order, on 24 August 2022. In my view, nothing
turns of these dates as will become
evident. The First Respondent
therefore contends on this basis, that the main application was
automatically dismissed.
[12]
The
First Respondent further contends that the ‘
applicants
ought to suffer the consequences of the actions of their erstwhile
attorneys
’
.
The answering affidavit does not specify why the remaining minor
Appellants should ‘
suffer
the consequences’
of
alleged non-compliance by one of the Appellants.
[31]
The March 2020 order did not only fail to inform
the party when the
dies
would
start running, but the order failed to make provision for the service
of the application to strike out the Appellants’
defence. The
Respondents seemed to be under the misapprehension that the striking
out of a defence is akin to an automatic barring
for failure to
deliver a pleading as envisaged in Rule 26 of the Uniform Rules of
Court. Rule 26 provides that a party will be
automatically barred if
he or she fails to deliver a replication or subsequent pleading
within the time limits or, having failed
to deliver a pleading other
than a replication or subsequent pleading within the stipulated time
limits, then fails to deliver
it within the time referred to in a
notice by his opponent to deliver such pleading. Being
ipso
facto
barred for failure to deliver a
pleading is not the end of the road for a litigant. The party is
simply barred from filing further
pleadings and the pleadings will be
deemed closed unless a substantive application is brought to remove
the bar in terms of Rule
27. It can never be, that a failure to
deliver a pleading or comply with a notice will result in an
ipso
facto
dismissal of a litigant’s
action in the absence of a substantive application to court seeking
the dismissal of his or her
case and/or default judgment being taken,
duly served on the legal representative of the party or upon personal
service, as the
case may be. The mere fact that an application is
brought
via
Chamber
Book, does not mean that parties are at liberty to disregard the
audi
alteram partem
principle, especially
where the dismissal of an action or application is sought.
[32]
In the first ruling, the Court a
quo
dismissed the application for declaratory relief.
Unfortunately, if one has regard to the Reasons provided, there is no
mention
at all as to how the court came to this decision. The Court a
quo
misdirected
itself by finding that the Appellants were barred from seeking a
declaratory order with regard to the March 2020 Order.
[33]
As is apparent, there are eight Appellants.
Startlingly, the effect of the order as it stands allows the claims
of the remaining
seven Appellants to be struck out,
mero
motu
without
notice due to the ostensible non-compliance of the First Appellant.
Not only is this impermissible, but it is also unconstitutional.
What
makes this matter all the more egregious, is the fact that the
majority of the Appellants are or were minors at the time claiming
from their late father’s estate. The Court a
quo
also misdirected itself by dismissing the
application in not appreciating the consequences of a dismissal of
all
seven
Appellants’ causes of actions, when the order to compel was
only against the First Appellant.
[34]
In its Reasons, the Court a
quo
referred to the various remedies available to the
First Appellant. It mentioned three options. The first was that it
could appeal
the order. The Chamber Book application and consequent
order was done
ex parte
.
The First Respondent avers that the Appellants could not appeal an
order taken by Chamber Book which they did not oppose. This
is
self-evident. In any event, the Court a
quo
failed to take into account Rule 42 which allowed
it to
mero motu
rescind
or vary an order. This a further basis for the appeal to succeed.
[35]
The second decision made was the dismissal of the
late amendment of the notice of motion to include relief which was
sought in terms
of paragraph 2 of the notice of motion. It is trite
that a party can seek an amendment at any stage before judgment in a
matter
has been delivered. What is striking in this matter is that
the Appellants were criticized for not adopted that particular course
of action and when they did, they were ostensibly penalised by the
court for doing so. It is trite that parties should not probate
and
approbate in proceedings, least of all presiding officers. The
failure to entertain the amendment, even though same was not
necessary if the Court had simply dealt with the issue of the
declaration, was a misdirection. As a consequence, there is no need
for me to consider whether or not there was compliance with Rule 42
as stated.
[36]
Finally, it is evident that the Court a
quo
failed to, at the very least, deal with the
substance of the application, which was for the main application to
be referred to oral
evidence given the nature of the dispute. The
Court a
quo
also
failed to deal with the
interim
request that pending the determination of the
dispute in the main application, that the Appellants were entitled to
a distribution
of moneys
in lieu
of their rights to maintenance by the estate and
for a contribution to their legal costs. It is common cause that the
prohibition
has been in place since July 2019. Clause 5 of that Order
provides as follows:
“
Pending
the determination of the matter, all income generated from the said
taxi business shall be paid by the First Applicant into
the estate
banking account, save for amounts reasonably required to fund the
operation of the said business.”
[37]
The effect of that Order, as argued by the
Appellants, is that all income generated from the taxi business of
the deceased is to
be utilised for the operation of that business or
paid into the relevant banking account. The Appellants state that at
the time
of the Deceased death, he was maintaining the First
Appellant and her siblings who relied upon the maintenance paid to
them by
the Deceased. They argue that due, in part, to the conduct of
the First Respondent, that they are unable to maintain themselves
and,
inter alia
,
the minor children’s school fees are unpaid. The Respondents
did not deal with these allegations. They simply reiterated
their
position that the main application had been dismissed.
[38]
It
is trite that the Master may, upon application and consent of the
executor provide subsidence of the deceased family or household
in
terms of section 26(1)(A) of the Administration of Estates Act
[13]
.
The July 2019 order makes such payment impossible and it was
accordingly on this basis that the Appellants sought to vary
paragraph
5 of that order to permit the distribution of money to the
Appellants
in
lieu
of
their rights to maintenance.
[39]
The Appellants contend, as stated, that the
Respondents are silent on this aspect. In fact, the parties could
hardly have envisaged
when the order was granted in 2019 that it
would take years for the main application to be heard, let alone
finalised. The court
a
quo
failed to deal with this aspect and it is
inconceivable that such an application would have been dismissed
mero
motu
. I am of the view that this court
is adequately placed to deal with the relief sought and that it would
be a travesty of justice
if the matter were to be remitted back to
the Court a
quo
for
hearing and determination when this court is apprised of all of the
facts before it. I therefore find no impediment to removing
the
restriction in paragraph 5 of the July 2019 order and varying it to
the extent as claimed since the prejudice to the Appellants
are
clearly established.
[40]
In sum, as a result of the various misdirection,
the appeal must succeed.
Costs
[41]
It is trite that costs usually follow the result.
In
casu
,
since the First Respondent is the executrix of the deceased estate,
the Appellants seek a cost order against the First Respondent
in her
personal capacity as opposed to from the deceased estate. They argue
that it would be unfair for the unreasonable costs
occasioned by the
opposition to the application and subsequent appeal to be paid from
the estate as the Appellants, as beneficiaries
would, in essence be
ultimately liable for those costs. I am in agreement with this
contention. It is clear that the Court a
quo
misdirected itself in the adjudication of a matter
which, on the face of it, could easily have been resolved by a
rectification
of the order or Declarator as it was patently evident
that the order granted in the stated terms was a clear error and
oversight
by the parties. The First Respondent opportunistically
through her legal representatives latched onto this error and sought
to
dismiss the cause of actions of the remaining beneficiaries due to
the ‘supposed’ non-compliance of the First Appellant.
It
is all the more unfortunate as this is a family dispute between the
mother as executrix and the children as Appellants and it
is always
desirable for these types of matters to be mediated before coming to
court. In any event, I am satisfied that the opposition
to the
application and subsequent appeal was unreasonable and there is no
reason why the beneficiaries, who would ultimately be
impacted if the
estate were ordered to pay the costs, must be mulcted with the costs.
I am satisfied that a personal cost order
against the First
Respondent is justified.
ORDER
[42]
In the circumstances, the following order is made:
1.
The appeal is upheld.
2.
Paragraph 1 of the amended notice of motion dated
24 July 2023 is granted.
3.
The Main application is referred to oral evidence
as per paragraph 3 of the amended notice of motion for the
determination of the
issue as to whether the First Respondent was
married to the late Daniel Khumalo at the time of his death.
4.
Pending the determination of the Main application,
the court order dated 30 July 2019 is varied to permit the
distribution of moneys
to the Appellants in
lieu
of their rights to maintenance by the estate and
for a contribution to the Appellants’ legal costs, subject to
the Master
of the High Court’s consent.
5.
The First Respondent is ordered to pay the costs
of the application and the appeal in her personal capacity on Scale
B.
DS KUSEVITSKY
JUDGE OF THE HIGH
COURT
I agree
T NDITA
JUDGE OF THE HIGH
COURT
I agree
MI SAMELA
JUDGE OF THE HIGH
COURT
For the Appellant
: Adv. D Van Reenen
Instructed by
: Lionel Murray Schwormstedt & Louw
For the Respondent : Adv.
A Busakwe
Instructed
by
: Cuma Lennox Pinini
[1]
Annexure
“TK9” to the application
[2]
paragraph
3.1of the application to compel
[3]
paragraph
3.2 of the application to compel
[4]
Annexure
“TK1” to the application
[5]
para
2.1 of the 19 March 2020 Order
[6]
para
2.3 of the 19 March 2020 Order
[7]
This
application was subsequently removed from the roll on 29 January
2022
[8]
paras
43 to 44 of the Founding affidavit
[9]
Western
Cape: PN 37 [Service 5, 2017]
[10]
Letter
dated 24 August 2022 (“TK6”)
[11]
This
is contrary to the letter of 24 August 2022. Unfortunately, neither
proof of service for the March 2020 order or the striking
out
application are annexed to the papers.
[12]
Again,
on their version, it was dismissed on 11 April 2022.
[13]
66
of 1965
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