May/June 2015
Qn 1
The municipality of eThekwini is busy with excavations in the
business center.
The Municipal workers do not erect any barrier or warning signs in
the vicinity of
the excavations. Mrs. Ndlovu, who is near-sighted, falls into the
excavations and
sustains serious injuries. She wishes to institute a delictual action
against the
municipality. Was the conduct of the municipality wrongful?
Discuss in detail.
[15]
The issue is whether the act of the municipality workers
constituted wrongfulness?
An act can usually be wrongful if it has some consequence. The
determination of
wrongfulness entails a dual investigation. Firstly it has to be
ascertained whether
the perpetrator’s act was in fact the cause of a harmful result to
another person and
secondly it must be ascertained whether the causing of harm took
place in an
unreasonable or legally reprehensible way.
The first part of the investigation is easy to establish, however the
second part of
whether the causing of the harm took place in an unreasonable or
legally
reprehensible way this is dealt with by looking at the legal
convictions of the
community (boni mores) If a person’s conduct is contra boni
mores that is to say if
its contrary to the legal convictions of the community then that
person would have
acted in a wrongful manner.
The court follows an objective test based on reasonableness,
based on legal
convictions of community and on all circumstances. The question
asked is: Did the
, defendant infringe interest of plaintiff reasonably or
unreasonably? Court must
weigh conflicting interests in light of circumstances.
Legal convictions of community are to be taken as the legal
convictions of policy
makers such as legislature and judges. Judge must define and
interpret legal
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convictions of community with regards to rights, principles, court
cases where
convictions of community found expression.
The following factors are considered the legal convictions of the
community.
These impute legal duties which when not followed constitutes an
act of
wrongfulness. These are:
Prior conduct
If a person has done something e.g. light a fire or a cigarette a
legal duty arises to
enable that no harm occurs from such conduct so one has to be
sure the fire is out
etc. By virtue of your prior conduct a legal duty arises to protect a
third party from
consequences of that conduct, failure which will result in a
delictual liability
arising from a wrongful act
Control of a dangerous object or a thing
A legal duty arises when one is in control of a dangerous object or
thing to protect
a third party from being harmed by that thing e.g. when one is in
control of a gun
or a bull dog. Failure to control that dangerous thing or object will
constitute
wrongfulness if that failure leads to a third party being harmed.
Rules of law
Certain statutes imputes legal duties on individuals for the
protection of third
parties and failure to follow these rules will constitute an act of
wrongfulness
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