Motion proceedings (including applications in terms of rule 31 of the CCMA rules) are not designed to resolve disputes of fact, but indeed disputes of law. What is the content of the test formulated in Plascon-Evans Paints Ltd v Van Riebeeck Paints 1984 (3) SA 623 (A) and so applied subsequently in Thebe Ya Bophelo Healthcare Administrators v National Bargaining Council for the Road Freight Industry 2009 (3) SA 187 (W) in determining how such disputes are resolved when considering whether the applicant is entitled to the relief claimed in such motion proceedings?
_____________________________________
- The facts averred in the applicant’s affidavit, admitted by the respondent, with the facts alleged by the respondent, must justify the order, unless:
- the dispute is not real or genuine (on the basis of a bare denial), or
- the denials in the respondent’s version are bald and uncreditworthy. or
- the respondent’s version raises obvious fictitious disputes of fact, or
- the respondent’s version is palpably implausible or farfetched, or so clearly untenable that the court is justified in rejecting that version
See, further, National Scrap Metal (Cape Town) v Murray and Roberts 2012 (5) SA 300 (SCA); Ndudane v Premier of Eastern Cape (2022) 33 SALLR 6 (ECB); National Director of Public Prosecutions v Zuma 2009 (2) SA 279 (SCA).
