Appeal court rules cultural adoption guidelines unlawful
The Supreme Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal by the Minister of Social Development and the Gauteng MEC for Social Development. Five judges condemned the department and its social workers for unlawful meddling in two adoptions and ordered the government parties to pay costs.
Justice Nambitha Dambuza wrote the judgment, which the court handed down on Tuesday. It upheld a 2022 finding by Johannesburg High Court judge Fiona Dippenaar that the guidelines were impermissible. The adoptions of two babies, called B and L, were finalised in May 2023 and August 2023.
Dambuza said the government parties kept arguing that the adoption proceedings must start afresh because the application documents did not comply. She said their lack of insight and persistence in seeking to have the children removed from their families was gravely unsettling.
The judge said there was "no conceivable reason why they should be wrenched from their families". The High Court had referred the social workers' conduct to the South African Council for Social Service Professions. Dambuza said it was necessary to draw that conduct to the attention of the professional body.
Key facts
- Who
- Nambitha Dambuza (Justice of the Supreme Court of Appeal, writing for the court); Fiona Dippenaar (Johannesburg High Court judge who ruled in 2022); Department of Social Development (government department whose social workers used the adoption guidelines…); Minister of Social Development (government party in the appeal)
- What
- Five SCA judges, in a judgment written by Justice Nambitha Dambuza, condemned the Department of Social Development and its social workers for unlawful meddling in two adoptions and upheld the High Court finding that the guidelines were impermissible. The court also ordered the government parties to pay costs.
- When
- 27 October 2026
- Where
- South Africa, Johannesburg, Gauteng
- Status
- Reported