BL Premium reports that the Supreme Court of Appeal has ruled that the application of BEE criteria in the disbursement of money from the Tourism Relief Fund was unlawful.

Appeal Court Judge Clive Plasket on Wednesday ruled against two judgments of the Pretoria High Court in matters brought separately by Solidarity and AfriForum to review and set aside what they described as “race-based criteria” to be eligible for assistance from the fund. The fund, which was set up in 2020 to help mitigate the effects of the Covid-19 lockdown on the tourism sector, has already disbursed R200m to small and medium enterprises but the court order doesn’t require that the money be recovered. The judge decided that even though the Tourism Relief Fund had been depleted it was in the public interest that judgment be passed on the appeals. The judge held that the Tourism Relief Fund was established under the Disaster Management Act and that former minister of tourism Mmamoloko Kubayi had not been legally obliged by the Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment Act, as she had argued, to make eligibility criteria for financial assistance subject to the Tourism Sector Code. Solidarity’s head of legal matters, Anton van der Bijl, welcomed the decision. “It is a victory for everyone in the tourism sector who has lost their revenue and businesses as a result of the government’s implementations of the Disaster Management Act, but also whom the government has rejected based on the colour of their skin,” he said.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Linda Ensor at BusinessLive (subscriber access only)
• Read Solidarity’s press statement on this matter at Solidarity News

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