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[2026] ZAGPJHC 536
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Aventador Gate (Pty) Ltd v South African Reserve Bank (2026/095670) [2026] ZAGPJHC 536 (7 May 2026)
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REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA
IN THE HIGH COURT OF SOUTH AFRICA
GAUTENG
LOCAL DIVISION, JOHANNESBURG
Case Number:
2026-095670
(1)
REPORTABLE: NO
(2)
OF INTEREST TO OTHER JUDGES: NO
(3)
REVISED: YES
In the matter between:
AVENTADOR GATE PTY LTD,
MPUMELELO
SITHOKOZOLE MKHIZE
Applicant
and
SOUTH AFRICAN RESERVE BANK,
ABSA
BANK
LIMITED
Respondent
JUDGMENT
C
E THOMPSON AJ
[1]
On 19 September 2025, the South African Reserve Bank (“SARB”)
issued a blocking order in respect of the Applicant’s
bank
account held with the Second Respondent due to suspected
contraventions of the Exchange Control Regulations.
[2]
This application was launched on 29 April 2026 and served on the SARB
after 16:00 on the same day by way of email.
A hard copy of the
application was physically served on the SARB on 30 April 2026.
The following day was a long weekend due
to the Friday, 1 May, being
Workers’ Day. The application was set down for hearing on
Tuesday 5 May 2026. The
answering affidavit, in terms of the
Notice of Motion required the SARB to file its answering affidavit by
30 April 2026.
In terms of the Notice of Motion the SARB was
afforded one court day to respond to this application.
[3]
Needless to state, the SARB’s answering affidavit was only
delivered on 4 May 2026. The SARB therefore, in
effect, had two
court days within which to deliver an answering affidavit. On
any interpretation of the process launched
by the Applicant, the
matter was proceeded with by the Applicant on the basis of extreme
urgency.
[4]
Counsel for the Applicant sought to argue that the matter was not
brought on extreme urgent grounds, but rather on ordinary
urgency.
This submission finds its genesis in the fact that the practice in
this Division is that urgent applications are
set down Thursday for
the following Tuesday. The argument relating to ordinary
urgency by the Applicant is misguided and
demonstrates a clear
misapprehension of urgency in general, degrees of urgency
specifically and overall the purpose of the Directives
of setting a
matter down by Thursday for the following Tuesday.
[5]
As far back as
Luna Meubel Vervaardigers (Edms) Bpk v Makin and
Another (t/a Makin’s Funiture Manufacturers)
1977 (4)
SA 135
(W) the court held that there are varying degrees of urgency.
Together with the principle of degrees of urgency one must consider
the general principle that urgency is not there for the taking and
must be explicitly advanced (see
East Rock Trading 7 (Pty) Ltd
v Eagle Valley Granite (Pty) Ltd
2012 JDR 1836 (GSJ).
Properly considered together, an Applicant must consider the legal
urgency with which a matter should
be proceeded with. In other
words, is the matter so urgent that the time periods for the delivery
of affidavits must be seriously
curtailed or is a matter merely
urgent to the degree that some relaxation of the ordinary time
periods is required.
[6]
Once this determination is made, the manner of compliance with the
Directives of this Court can be considered. If
the matter is of
such a degree of urgency that the launching and filing of papers must
occur in the same week so as to have all
the papers filed by Thursday
in order for the matter to be heard the following week Tuesday, then
a case for that degree of urgency
must be made out in the founding
papers. The less time that is afforded to a Respondent to
answer to an urgent application,
the higher the degree of urgency is
with which the matter is proceeded with.
[7]
This does not mean that every matter that is launched during a
particular week must be heard the following week Tuesday.
This
is where the assessment of the degree of urgency and diligence by
practitioners are required. It is perfectly possible
and
permissible, depending on the degree of urgency that can be made out,
if any, to launch a matter during a particular week and
only have
that matter heard in two weeks’ time. To use this matter
as a general example, if the Applicant launched
its urgent
application on 29 April 2026, the Applicant would have been perfectly
within its rights to seek the enrolment of the
matter for 12 May
2026. The only requirement would be that the papers in the
matter then had to be in order by Thursday 7
May 2026.
[8]
For reasons not known to the court, the Applicant did not elect to
proceed with the matter in that manner. Instead,
the Applicant
(wrongly I might add), considered it necessary to launch the
application on 29 April 2026 for papers to be filed
by 30 April 2026
so that the matter could be heard on 5 May 2026. Having regard
to the blocking order having been issued
on 19 September 2025
already, there was a greater need for the Applicant to explain why
such extremely curtailed time-periods were
all of a sudden necessary.
Counsel could not, despite being probed thereon, explain why
the matter could not wait until next
week, 12 May 2026. He
remained steadfast in his position that the application is brought on
“ordinary” urgency
as required by the Directives.
[9]
To make matters worse for the Applicant, the Applicant stated in its
founding affidavit that at the commencement of the
year it decided to
await the investigation by the SARB. The problem for the
Applicant is that in terms of the Currency Act,
this blocking order
may remain in force for a period of 36 months, meaning that at a
worst-case scenario, the investigation can
be conducted over a period
of 36 months. The decision to await the investigation is, in my
view, a tacit acquiescence that
there is no urgency to the lifting of
the blocking order. If there was anything that caused the
Applicant to decide that
it will no longer await the outcome of the
investigation, it would have had to explain what that catalyst was.
If the Applicant
did not know of the 36 month period and sought to
avoid the inference of a tacit acquiescence, the Applicant would have
had to
make out that case. If the Applicant was of the view
that it believed the investigation would be conducted over a
reasonably
short period of time, the Applicant would have had to make
out that case. The Applicant did not seek to avoid its own
tacit
acquiescence.
[10]
After the passing of several months, the Applicant then decides to
approach court on seriously curtailed time periods,
and which
time-periods cannot be said to be commensurate with the any degree of
urgency that is borne from the seriously curtailed
time periods.
The Applicant fails to explain the need to place the SARB to the
sword of delivering an answering affidavit
in one day where the
blocking order has been in place for months. The repeated
fallback position of that is what the Directives
require is misguided
and ill-founded. All it does do is demonstrate a lack of proper
understanding of the workings of the
urgent processes and procedures
in terms of Rule 6(12)(a) and as further required by the Directives.
As already stated, the
Applicant could have more properly enrolled
the matter for 12 May 2026, or possibly even on a later date on the
basis of semi-urgency.
I add that nothing in the above
exposition must be construed that the Applicant should enroll the
matter for a later date and that
an urgent court will be bound to
then hear the matter. The Applicant will still have to make out
a case that the matter is
urgent or semi-urgent for that urgent
court, should the Applicant elect to proceed on such a basis.
This judgment is neither
permission to do so nor is it an
encouragement to do so. Rather, on the facts of the matter,
quite the contrary.
[11]
As the Applicant’s seriously curtailed time-periods is not
commensurate with the facts of the matter and the need
for such
short-notice to the SARB is not explained, I found that the matter
lacks urgency and struck the matter of the roll.
The unduly
curtailed time-periods, considering the facts of the matter, renders
the extremely urgent approach to the urgent court
an abuse of the
process of court. No heed was paid to
Luna Meubels
or to
East Rock Trading
.
Applicant’s
should be dissuaded from approaching the urgent court on a basis that
is not supported by the facts of the matter.
[12]
A punitive costs order, in my view, will send out a strong message to
practitioners to properly and carefully consider
whether a matter is
urgent and, if so, the degree of urgency that exists. Once a
practitioner has made that determination,
the legal practitioner must
then impose time-periods that is commensurate with such degree of
urgency. This requires legal
practitioners to properly apply
their minds and advise clients as to the proper procedural approach
in respect of time-periods.
In this matter, none of the
aforesaid was brought to bear on the matter. As such I was of
the view that a punitive costs
order was warranted and struck the
matter of the roll with costs on the attorney and client scale.
C E THOMPSON AJ
JUDGE OF THE HIGH COURT
JOHANNESBURG