Legal

South Africa has been fighting corruption with legislation that, frankly, lacked teeth. The Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act 12 of 2004 (PRECCA) has long been the cornerstone of the country's anti-corruption framework - criminalising bribery, fraud and a broad range of corrupt conduct in both the public and private sectors. The law was there. The convictions, historically, were not. That is rapidly changing.

When a senior advisor or executive walks out the door, especially to join a competitor, your restraint of trade clause is often the only thing standing between you and serious commercial damage. Here is what recent South African case law tells us about what works, what does not and what you need to do now.

Contaminated land is rarely a contained technical problem. A site may have a defined boundary on a map. However, its risks can change as groundwater moves, land use shifts, climate conditions become less predictable and surrounding land uses change over time.

In March 2026, the South African Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) handed down a significant decision in The Regents of the University of California & Others vs Eurolab (Pty) Ltd & Others. The case turned on a deceptively simple question: who is legally entitled to apply for a patent under South African law?

If there is one thing organisations know well, it is that disputes are expensive. The expense extends beyond legal fees. It also includes management time, damaged relationships and strategic distraction. A supplier dispute that should take weeks can consume months of senior attention. For multinationals juggling cross-jurisdictional matters, the logistical burden alone can dwarf the value of the underlying claim.

On 10 April 2016, the plaintiff was admitted to a private hospital complaining of pain in her left knee. Unbeknown to anyone at the time, the plaintiff had suffered a ruptured aneurysm in her popliteal artery. The rupture resulted in limited blood flow to her lower left leg.

Seventy years ago, some 20,000 women marched to the Union Buildings. They took a stand against a proposed law that would strip them of their freedom of movement and ownership of themselves. The law would force them to carry passes that dictated where they could live, work and exist.

A Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) creates a protected space in which parties can exchange commercially sensitive information. Yet a few apparently innocuous words dealing with information retained in “unaided memory” may materially reduce that protection. In extreme cases, they may undermine the commercial purpose of the NDA itself.

A brand runs an on-pack promotion: buy a product, find the code inside, enter it on an app, and you might win a prize.  The prize could range from a free lunch to an all-expenses-paid trip to Paris. Thousands of people enter, and a winner is drawn. The marketing team would love to announce the winner with a photograph and a celebratory post on social media. However, the winner would rather not.

White-collar crime in Africa is no longer a predominantly domestic concern. It has expanded onto an international stage, and so has the corporate exposure that comes with it. As capital crosses borders, data moves at the speed of light, and corporate structures become more complex, economic crime has kept pace. It has become more sophisticated, more multinational and increasingly difficult to investigate and prosecute within the confines of a single legal system.