Mansingh v General Council of the Bar and Others

The applicant, an advocate and member of the Johannesburg Society of Advocates, challenged the President’s constitutional authority to confer the status of senior counsel (silk) on advocates. She sought declaratory relief in the North Gauteng High Court that section 84(2)(k) of the Constitution, which empowers the President to confer honours, does not include the power to award senior counsel status. The High Court agreed and granted declaratory relief. On appeal by professional bodies of advocates, the Supreme Court of Appeal reversed that decision, holding that the conferral of senior counsel status constitutes an honour within the meaning of section 84(2)(k). The applicant then sought leave to appeal to the Constitutional Court.

Leave to appeal was granted, but the appeal was dismissed. The order of the Supreme Court of Appeal, upholding the President’s power to confer senior counsel status under section 84(2)(k), was confirmed.

The case authoritatively confirms that the President’s constitutional power to confer honours includes the conferral of senior counsel status on advocates. It clarifies the scope of section 84(2)(k) and affirms a purposive, text-based approach to interpreting presidential powers, resolving longstanding uncertainty about the constitutional basis of the silk system in South Africa.