This photograph was taken outside the Constitutional Court of South Africa on November 5th 2017, the day the State’s appeal to the Western Cape High Court ‘privacy’ judgement was heard by a bench of 10 Judges. We were given leave to enter our Trial Of The Plant evidence into the proceedings and effectively join and bolster the Western Cape plaintiffs challenge at the highest court in the land. Since then we have waited patiently for the Court to come up with a ruling and have been asked countless numbers of times by journalists and the public, ‘when is the judgement coming‘?
It’s coming and the irony is, after a nine month wait for this groundbreaking day, we are a 1000k’s away in Port Elizabeth on our Desired Outcomes road trip, but at least the wait is over.
On the morning of the 18th September we’ll fly up to Johannesburg to be in court with leader of the Dagga Party, Jeremy Acton, and his co-plaintiff, Ras Gareth Prince to hear what the bench has to say of our evidence, and whether they will uphold the Cape Town High Court judgement.
It’s all a little nerve wracking to say the least. Will this be the ruling we’ve all been waiting for, or will the bench tell us to return to Pretoria to finish the Trial Of The Plant?
There is no way of telling. Not even our A-Team at Schindlers Attorneys have been able to second guess the way things will go. Will it be a cut and dry ruling, or will it take all day to disseminate this far reaching decision by the court?
We are planning to live stream the event and will give you more details of this on our Facebook pages and Twitter feed as the day develops with the hashtag #concourt2018.
You can view an album of the November 2017 Constitutional Court day here: http://bit.ly/concourt_nov17
Congratulations guys for your enormous part in this victory!
When the judgement was handed down on 18 September 2018, I told some friends and colleagues that “this day is going to make history”, especially if cannabis becomes permitted. Your endurance and sometimes suffering was noted loudly and clearly considering the objection/ignorance/ridicule from less informed neighbours, the nastiness from the authorities (who only did their job I guess) and the long time it all took to get to this point. These experiences could not have been easy. You guys are iconic! Proud of you