The High Court decided that secs 65J(2)(b)(i) and 65J(2)(b)(ii) of the Magistrates’ Court Act 32 of 1944 (MCA) are constitutionally invalid to the extent that they allow for emoluments attachment orders to be issued by a clerk of the Magistrates’ Court without judicial oversight. ‘This is so both with regard to international law and to the current jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court’. Emoluments attachment orders contemplated in s 65J of the MCA allow the attachment of the earnings of debtors and oblige the garnishee, the employer, to pay specific instalments to the judgment creditors or their attorneys, out of such earnings. Those instalments have to be paid until the judgment debt and legal costs are paid in full.
University of Stellenbosch Legal Aid Clinic v Minister of Justice (16703/14) [2015] ZAWCHC 99 (8 July 2015) per Desai J.
Reported
[2015] 3 All SA 644; (2015) ILJ 2558; [2015] JOL 33485 (HC)
The appeal in this matter is being argued on 3 March 2016 under case no CCT127/15.
see Emolument attachment orders: Confirmation of declaratory order