Environmentalists, their lawyers and Wild Coast communities have welcomed the landmark Constitutional Court judgment which on Friday definitively blocked Shell and Impact Africa from any chance of renewing their Wild Coast oil and gas exploration rights.
It has taken more than a decade, interdicts, court applications and numerous other skirmishes to untangle the mess that started with mineral and petroleum resources minister Gwede Mantashe in 2014 granting the oil and gas exploration right.
“If ants work together they can lift a log [African proverb],” Sustaining the Wild Coast director Sinegugu Zukulu said.
Zukulu was one of the applicants in the court case.
“At last we have been able to assert the rights of indigenous people over the profits of global corporations.
“It is a win, not just for us as indigenous people, but also for the environment and the planet.”
Amadiba Crisis Committee spokesperson Nonhle Mbutuma said losing the court case had not been an option.
“Communities will take the government to court again and again as long as we have a government for the corporations and not for the people.
“But true development must come from the people. We as a people must determine our own future.”
Natural Justice director Delme Cupido said the judgment was a historic victory for all South Africans who cared about the environment, the rule of law and the future.
“Beyond the technical legal arguments, this case has always been about whether the interests and profits of multinational corporations override the rights of communities to effectively participate in decisions that will affect their livelihoods, their rights to a healthy environment, and their cultural and spiritual rights.
“The court affirmed that the right to public participation is not just about following a procedure and ticking boxes, but rather that it is about placing the dignity of our people at the centre of developmental decisions that will affect them.”
Another applicant, local Kei Mouth fisher Sazise Maxwell Pekayo said the court had put people and the environment over profit.
“We, as communities, did not know that we had the power to challenge the government.”
The lawyers representing the environmental organisations and coastal communities who took on big oil and the South African government also welcomed the judgment.
Kimal Harvey, from the Legal Resources Centre, said the judgment confirmed that no decision about land or resources could be made without consulting the people affected.
“Most notably, it held that the interests of multinational corporations shall never trump the rights of the people.
“The SCA sought to give Shell a back door to ensure their investment was not wasted.
“The CC shut that door in favour of the coastal communities who argued that their spiritual, cultural, customary and environmental rights are too important to disregard.
“This is a resounding win.”
Natural Justice attorney Melissa Groenink-Groves said it was a victory for coastal communities, constitutional democracy and the continued rigour of the judiciary and judicial processes.
“The Constitutional Court prefaced its judgment on the deep connection that coastal communities have with the ocean for their livelihoods, their spirituality and their culture, and recognised that the protection of ecological systems is inseparable from the protection of the rights to dignity, culture and livelihood.”
Cormac Cullinan, from Cullinan and Associates, said the judgment ensured the “safeguarding of fundamental human rights in the face of determined efforts by multinationals to deepen society’s reliance on fossil fuels ... is a victory for the rule of law and vindicates years of courageous opposition by Wild Coast communities and environmentalists”.
Greenpeace Africa legal adviser Eugene Perumal said the ruling vindicated grassroots communities of the Wild Coast, civil society organisations and the legal teams that had fought tirelessly together.
“The message from the Constitutional Court today is clear: people and their constitutional rights come before corporate profits.”
In its judgment, the court confirmed the unlawfulness of the exploration right and reaffirmed that the “protection of ecological systems is inseparable from the protection of rights to dignity, culture and livelihood”.
Brief history of the case:
Wild Coast communities and environmental groups launched legal action to stop the offshore seismic surveys which in 2022 culminated in a full bench of the Makhanda high court declaring the decision unlawful and setting it — as well as two subsequent renewals of that right — aside.
In 2024, the Supreme Court of Appeal agreed that the process followed had been unlawful.
But it threw the two companies a lifeline by suspending the setting aside of the right pending a decision by the minister on Shell and Impact Africa’s third and final application to renew the exploration permit.
The SCA said this was a “just and equitable” remedy given that the two companies had spent more than R1bn on the process and had only one last opportunity to renew it.
It said the department had also subsequently placed a moratorium on exploration rights over the entire South African coast, and Shell and Impact might never get the opportunity to exercise the right.
It ordered the two companies to correct the defects identified in their consultation process.
2026: The Constitutional Court declared the companies should not be allowed to use their third renewal application to fix an initial, unlawful consultation process.
It said the defects were not limited to the consultation process but also the failure by the minister to consider environmental impacts, including climate change.
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