A Snapshot of the Constitutional Court's Docket – January to July 2024

Abstract

Most commentary on the Constitutional Court focuses on its published judgments. Yet the vast majority of applications made to the Court are disposed of in chambers. Empirical studies on this aspect of the Court's work has been limited. Using available online records, we monitored and tracked trends in petitions filed between 1 January 2024 and 26 July 2024. We also extracted some information relating to petitions filed in 2023. We present an overview of the number of petitions received by the Court between January 2023 and July 2024, as well as the rate at which the Court appears to be processing such applications. We then consider the nature of the petitions filed with the Court during the first two terms of 2024. Our analysis includes an overview of the route that litigants have travelled in reaching the Court, the area(s) of law the petitions engage, and for cases which were dismissed, the reasons for dismissal. We find that there are large gaps in the Court's disposition of new applications, and that the processing time for most petitions is relatively prolonged. The data also suggests that the Court is inundated with generalist appeals, as opposed to matters raising issues of special constitutional or public importance. We conclude by briefly outlining some recommendations for further consideration