Some of South Africa\u2019s biggest law firms have asked a court to set aside the nation\u2019s policy governing Black ownership and representation in the profession, saying that it’s \u201cunlawful\u201d and \u201cunworkable\u201d in its present form.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Gauteng High Court will hear the request to set aside the so-called Legal Sector Code, published by Trade Minister Parks Tau in September 2024, from 4 to 8 May. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Norton Rose Fulbright initially brought the legal proceedings to the court and Bowmans, Webber Wentzel and Werksmans have intervened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The firms argue that the revised code removes recognition for several established measures aimed at so-called transformation \u2014 a term for policies addressing apartheid-era exclusion through steps such as increasing Black ownership and staffing, and expanding skills development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Among the concerns raised, the firms said the new code \u201cwrongly excludes\u201d Black non-lawyers from management control scoring, even though professionals in areas such as human resources, technology and accounting often hold critical senior management and leadership roles in law firms, Bowmans, Webber Wentzel and Werksmans said in a statement on Wednesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Under South Africa\u2019s policy framework on economic empowerment, companies are rated on scorecards that look at Black South African representation in ownership and leadership, as well as what the firms do to promote the development of non-Whites\u2019 skills and communities. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The level on the scorecard affects companies\u2019 eligibility for government contracts and their ability to do business with other corporates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The firms propose that instead of implementing the Code, the government allow the generic codes to continue to apply to the legal process \u201cwhile a lawful, evidence-based and properly constructed LSC is developed.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That would \u201cavoid any regulatory vacuum while allowing the sector and government to produce a code that genuinely advances transformation,\u201d they said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Some of South Africa\u2019s biggest law firms have asked a court to set aside the nation\u2019s policy governing Black ownership and representation in the profession, saying that its \u201cunlawful\u201d and \u201cunworkable\u201d in its present form.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":807494,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[11709,9455,17285],"class_list":["post-858738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-bowmans","tag-webber-wentzel","tag-werkmans"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=858738"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858738\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":858739,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858738\/revisions\/858739"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/807494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=858738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=858738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=858738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}