As attorneys are aware, some judgments really do take a long time. They are not necessarily on the most complex of matters, and sometimes in relatively simple matters one can await judgments for many months. Some judgments have apparently been outstanding for three or four years, and now four Pretoria Judges are apparently going to appear before Tribunals of the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) to discuss these slow judgment periods.

There may well be some valid reasons for some of those delays, but convening such a Tribunal will also have the effect that Judges would not wish to be named in future, and it may well lead to judgments being issued faster in most cases than has previously been the case. The Law Society of the Northern Provinces said that if justice is delayed, justice is denied, and that there is thus a need for judgments to be delivered faster. The reserved judgment register, where attorneys record all reserved judgments, has clearly played a very valuable role in gathering the information and painting an accurate picture as to where the particular problems may be and the courts have advised that the next list, which will be published in January 2014 will be a public list – in other words, the names of the Judges involved in the judgments will be made public.