Lawyers in South Africa
South African law consists of the common law and statutory law. The
law is not codified and, like English law, must be sought in court decisions and individual statutes. Since
1994, the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa has been the supreme law. The third arm of the central government is an independent judiciary.
The Constitutional Court is the highest court for interpreting and deciding constitutional issues while the
Supreme Court of Appeal is the highest court for nonconstitutional matters.
The Pretoria Bar Association The
legal profession is divided into two branches: attorneys, sometimes referred to as lawyers, and advocates.
Therefore, an attorney needs to be readily accessible to everyone, and the service he or she supplies needs to
be broad enough to cover a wide field of legal problems.
The Corporate Lawyers Association CLASA is a non-profit association managed by a Board, and an Executive Committee, elected by CLASA’s
members. The Association is funded by members’ subscriptions and by revenue generated by educational courses and
other activities. CLASA currently has approximately 340 members, including corporate lawyer representatives of
50 companies and other organisations. Where matters are not specifically
governed by the insurance legislation, they will be governed by general principles of South African law, such as
contract or delict. No insurer may ask or induce a consumer to waive their rights in terms of the rules, and if
they do give any such waiver, it will be regarded as void. In highly technical matters that are frequently the
subject of arbitration, receipt of expert summaries so late in the proceedings readily lends itself to
last-minute applications for postponement. A consumer’s right to privacy and to restrict unwanted direct
marketing is also entrenched in the Consumer Protection Act, including the times when consumers may be contacted
at home for any promotion with a five day cooling off period. During October 2010 the South African Consumer
Protection Act will come into force and effect. The South African insurance industry accounts for 71% of
Africa's total premiums and has the third-highest insurance penetration, in the world. An independent
intermediary shall not charge, in addition to any remuneration contemplated in section 48, any fee which is
payable by a policyholder, unless the amount thereof is disclosed expressly and separately to the policyholder
by the intermediary.
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