E-toll interdict application three years late: SANRAL

When the court adjourned for lunch on Tuesday, Judge Bill Prinsloo had struck OUTA and other applicants’ application to amend their case from the roll and Sanral was busy making their case for why the proceedings should not qualify for an urgent hearing before the court.

Advocate David Unterhalter SC, for Sanral, told Prinsloo that the applicants’ case was built solely on opposing the declaration of the about 185km of roads as toll roads.

He painted a picture for the court of the timeline of events that led to the looming date for the implementation of e-tolls on April 30, stating that the decision to declare the relevant roads as toll roads was already taken in 2008, after consultation with the public.

Unterhalter said that the process prior to 2008 was not “obscure” or “secret” and that those opposed could’ve made submissions then.

He further argued that if for some reason that specific date was missed and legal review was not sought in the allowed 180 days after the decision was made, there could be no doubt by 2011 that e-tolling was going ahead.

He said that the original tariffs were published already in February 2011 and that all public declarations made by the minister after that date always indicated that the only issue open for discussion was the level of the tariffs and not the user-pay method.

Unterhalter said that if the applicant’s wanted to wait and see if they could influence the process through persuasion then it was their right to do so, but that litigation could not be “the remedy of last resort”.

He said that simply waiting and watching the actions of the decision being implemented – the gantries being built, tenders going out – and bringing litigation only at this late hour was “fundamentally subversive” of what judicial review requires.

Unterhalter said Judge Prinsloo will have to be persuaded by the applicants why they waited almost three years to bring their urgent application and that convincing him of such was going to be a “heroic effort”.

When the court reconvenes again at 14:00 the legal team for the second and third respondents, the Minister of Transport and the MEC, will state their case opposing the urgent nature of the application.

Source: MoneyWeb