CONSTITUTIONAL COMMENTARY AND EVENTS

There has been a small ray of hope amidst the catastrophic state of public healthcare in South Africa, thanks to recent reports from the Presidential Health Summit (the Summit), held on 19 and 20 October 2018. 

The Summit was convened to find collaborative solutions to the mammoth challenges facing South Africa’s health system and included various health sector stakeholders. According to the Deputy President’s closing remarks, short-term outcomes of the Summit included filling critical vacant posts in the health system; developing a sustainable financing model for the health system by National Treasury and prioritising maintenance upgrading of health infrastructure.  This initiative speaks directly to the need to promote the constitutional principle of ensuring “efficient, economic and effective use of resources”, as required in section 195(1)(b) of the Constitution.

In a constitutional democracy, it is assumed spouses have equal bargaining power on negotiating which matrimonial property regime will govern their marriage. However, the lived reality is that women in South Africa’s historical patriarchal system did not necessarily have equal bargaining power and find themselves today vulnerable during divorce proceedings. To address this reality, the Divorce Act of 1979 (the Act) provided for judicial intervention in terms of section 7(3). Section 7(3) of the Act makes it possible for a spouse married out of community of property, to apply for a redistribution of assets in divorce proceedings. The Court must determine what would be just and equitable and this provision has been hailed as an important safeguard against the severe consequences of a complete separation of property. This legislative safeguard however was (despite good intentions) not available to many women until the recent Constitutional Court judgment of Holomisa v Holomisa and Another (the Holomisa matter).