Search for:
Category

South Africa

Category

A. LEGISLATION AND RULES A.1       Legislation International arbitration in South Africa continues to be governed by the International Arbitration Act, 15 of 2017 (“IA Act”), which incorporates the UNCITRAL Model Law. Domestic arbitrations in South Africa continue to be governed by the Arbitration Act, 42 of 1965 (“Arbitration Act”). A.2       Institutions, rules and infrastructure The Arbitration Foundation of Southern Africa (AFSA) and the Association of Arbitrators, Southern Africa, remain the primary domestic arbitration organizations used…

Overview In recent years, South Africa has reviewed its BITs on the basis that it believed that the BITs were too restrictive and outdated. As a result, South Africa has, since 2012, terminated its BITs with many European countries, including Denmark, Spain, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland and the Netherlands.[1] This led to the promulgation of the Protection of Investment Act in 2015 (“the Act”), which came into effect on 13 July 2018. Purpose and application of…

After a long wait, the South African International Arbitration Act No. 15 of 2017 sailed through the legislature in November and was assented to by the South African President on 20 December 2017. It is available here (GG 41347 of 20 December 2017). As the Act does not state that it will commence on a date to be set by the President, it has commenced, subject to the transitional provisions (s 20), staggered dates for…

Editor’s Note: This is the second of two articles on recent developments related to expropriations in Zimbabwe. This article deals with new legislation concerning the nationalization of the diamond mining industry, while the first article, by Andy Moody and Richard Allen, covers a recently leaked ICSID award concerning Zimbabwean land reforms. Within the last few weeks, the Government of Zimbabwe under President Robert Mugabe announced that it would nationalize the entirety of Zimbabwe’s diamond mining…