AGLC4 Rule 23.1.1: Cases: General Rule

Cite South African cases under chapter 2. Where a judge is named, Judge President is abbreviated JP after the name. The court, or the division of the Supreme Court or High Court, may be added using the names in the table, but the geographical location of a division is left out.

AGLC4 page 247

Formatting

  • The case name is italic; S, meaning the State in criminal cases, is italic as part of the name.
  • The year is in square brackets, followed by the volume, SA and the starting page.
  • A page pinpoint follows after a comma, and a paragraph pinpoint in square brackets follows it after a space.
  • Judge President is written JP after the judge's name, with no full stops.
  • A judge follows in round brackets, and the court follows in a second pair of round brackets.
  • Court names are taken from the table, without any place name.

Examples

Quoted from the Guide, page 247
  1. 1
    Christian Education South Africa v Minister of Education [1999] 2 SA 83 (Constitutional Court).
  2. 2
    Mahlangu v De Jager [2000] 3 SA 145 (Land Claims Court).
  3. 3
    Belvedere Sugar Co (Pty) Ltd v Sugar Industry Central Board [1962] 1 SA 221, 230 (Williamson JP).
  4. 4
    S v Zinn [1969] 2 SA 537, 540 (Rumpff JA) (Appellate Division).
  5. 5
    Soller No v G [2003] 5 SA 430, 437–8 [22]–[27] (Satchwell J) (Local Division). [Not: … (Witwatersrand Local Division).]

Not

Quoted from the Guide, page 247
  • … (Witwatersrand Local Division).
    the location of the division must be left out.

Names to use for South African courts in citations

Quoted from the Guide, page 247
Court(s)Court Name for Citations
Constitutional Court(Constitutional Court)
The current Supreme Court of Appeal(Supreme Court of Appeal)
The former Appellate Division of the Supreme Court(Appellate Division)
All current locations of the High Court (for example, ‘North West High Court, Mafikeng’)(High Court)
All former Supreme Court local and provincial divisions (for example, ‘Cape Provincial Division’)(Local Division)/(Provincial Division)
All former Supreme Court divisions not designated ‘local’ or ‘provincial’ (for example, ‘Eastern Cape Division’)(Supreme Court)

See also

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Formats, examples, passages, tables and the forms marked Not are quoted from the Australian Guide to Legal Citation (4th ed, Melbourne University Law Review Association, 2018), with the page of the Guide they appear on. Titles, summaries and explanations are our own.