Author: Martin Akuma

The recent suspension of Fannie Masemola has sent ripples through South Africa’s law enforcement community, revealing not merely a political scandal, but the unsettling reality of procurement fraud as a systemic risk. As allegations swirl around Masemola, who is accused of breaching the Public Finance Management Act in connection with a R360 million healthcare contract awarded to Medicare24, questions regarding the integrity of procurement processes loom large, says Servaas du Plessis, CEO of XTND, a company specialising in the prediction and detection of white-collar crime.With approximately R50 million disbursed before the contract was halted, the case exemplifies both a governance…

Oliver Tambo (born October 27, 1917, Bizana, Pondoland district, Transkei [now in Eastern Cape], South Africa—died April 24, 1993, Johannesburg) was the president of the South African black-nationalist African National Congress (ANC) between 1967 and 1991. He spent more than 30 years in exile (1960–90).Tambo was born in a Transkei village of subsistence farmers. He attended Anglican and Methodist mission schools and the University of Fort Hare (B.S., 1941) and later studied law. In 1944 with Nelson Mandela and others, he cofounded the ANC Youth League, which revitalized the ANC after a moribund period. After briefly teaching mathematics and science…

You’re racing to meet a deadline. You paste a confidential legal memo into ChatGPT to quickly summarise the key risks. Or you feed Claude the facts of your case to help draft a response to regulators. It feels efficient. But have you just destroyed your legal privilege? A recent United States court decision has sent shockwaves through the legal community. In United States v Heppner, a federal judge ruled that a defendant’s communications with an AI chatbot were not protected by privilege. This reasoning applies directly to South African law, and the implications are profound. This article unpacks what South…

The decision has been welcomed by the Competition Commission as a positive step aligned with the government’s aims to increase investment and growth. South Africa has altered its merger thresholds for the first time since 2017, following a review by the Competition Commission of South Africa. The amendments were gazetted by Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition Parks Tau on 8 May. The revisions were announced as part of government efforts to improve efficiency under its agenda targeting higher levels of growth and investment. The new thresholds for combined turnover/asset value have been confirmed at ZAR 1 billion (USD 59.9…

Awam Mavimbela|Published 2 weeks agoAs Freedom Day approaches, it forces an uncomfortable but necessary question: what does freedom really mean if access to justice still depends on money, particularly the ability to afford quality legal representation?On paper, South Africa has one of the most progressive Constitutions in the world, promising equality before the law. However, in practice, that equality does not always translate into lived reality. The issue is not only whether rights exist, but whether individuals are able to exercise them effectively when it matters most.The recent legal matters involving Julius Malema make this inequality more visible. This article…

Bertus Preller|Published 2 months agoIn a viral essay titled “Something Big Is Happening” published on 9 February 2026, AI entrepreneur Matt Shumer draws a stark parallel between the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic and the current trajectory of artificial intelligence.Shumer, co-founder and CEO of OthersideAI, a company behind HyperWrite, an advanced AI autocomplete tool and an investor in cutting-edge AI ventures like Groq and Etched, has spent over six years building and funding AI startups.With a background that includes founding tech companies while still in high school and studying at Syracuse University, Shumer positions himself as an insider witnessing…

As of 1 May 2026, South Africans will see the implementation of the increased annual earnings threshold of R269,600.90. The earnings threshold impacts the application of provisions of the Basic Conditions of Employment Act 75 of 1997, the Labour Relations Act 66 of 1995 and the Employment Equity Act 55 of 1998. The earnings threshold impacts the application of provisions of the Basic Conditions of Employment Act 75 of 1997 (BCEA), the Labour Relations Act 66 of 1995 (LRA) and the Employment Equity Act 55 of 1998 (EEA). In terms of the BCEA, employees earning more than the earnings threshold…

The Legal Practice Council (LPC), in defending the Legal Sector Code (LSC), told the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, that South Africa’s legal profession today still bears the imprint of an exclusionary past and that the numbers are a testament to this.The LPC is one of the parties opposing the application by four of the country’s top law firms, who are asking the court to overturn the sector-specific B-BBEE framework for the South African legal profession gazetted by the Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition, Parks Tau, in September 2024.The application was brought by Deneys (formerly Norton Rose Fulbright), Bowmans, Webber…

There are deaths that happen naturally. There are deaths caused by sickness. There are deaths caused by accidents and the unpredictability of life. And then there are deaths deliberately manufactured by systems—slowly, methodically, coldly—until a human being is reduced from flesh and dignity into a mere shadow of himself. That is the story of Patrick Ndangoh. He was not arrested on a battlefield. He was not caught carrying weapons. He was never granted the dignity of a transparent trial before a competent civilian court in Cameroon. Like many Southern Cameroonians over the years, he was simply rounded up in the…

The political developments of the international system are increasingly being transformed not only by military strength and economic resources but also by the clever use of international law. The litigation case of South Africa versus Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) is one such example that marks an important turning point in this regard. It shows how countries, particularly those in the developing world, are using international law to question existing power arrangements. At the same time, the diplomatic stance adopted by China has raised the issue from that of a purely legal dispute into one that is…