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Protection of Businesses Act, 1978 (Act No. 99 of 1978)

1. Prohibition of enforcement of certain foreign judgments, orders, directions, arbitration awards and letters of request and furnishing of information relating to businesses in compliance with foreign orders, directions or letters of request

 

(1) Notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in any law or other legal rule, and except with the permission of the Minister of Economic Affairs—
(a) no judgment, order, direction, arbitration award, interrogatory, commission rogatoire, letters of request or any other request delivered, given or issued or emanating from outside the Republic in connection with any civil proceedings and arising from any act or transaction contemplated in subsection (3), shall be enforced in the Republic;
(b) no person shall in compliance with or in response to any order, direction, interrogatory, commission rogatoire, letters of request or any other request issued or emanating from outside the Republic in connection with any civil proceedings, furnish any information as to any business whether carried on in or outside the Republic.

[Sub-section (1)  substituted by section 36 of Act 75 of 1996.]

 

(2)        The permission contemplated in subsection (1) (b) may—

(a) be granted either by notice in the Gazette or by written authority addressed to a particular person;
(b) be granted subject to such conditions as the said Minister may deem fit;
(c) relate only to specified goods or businesses or classes of goods or businesses, or to orders, directions, interrogatories, commissions rogatoire, letters of request or any other request issued in or emanating from a specified country;

[Paragraph (c) substituted by section 1 (c) of Act 87 of 1987.]

(d) if it is granted by notice in the Gazette, relate only to specified persons or classes of persons.

 

(3) In the application of subsection (1) (a) an act or transaction shall be an act or transaction which took place at any time, whether before or after the commencement of this Act, and is connected with the mining, production, importation, exportation, refinement, possession, use or sale of or ownership to any matter or material, of whatever nature, whether within, outside, into or from the Republic.

[Sub-section (3) substituted  by section 1 (d) of Act 87 of 1987.]