Indopedia All Things Marijuana
South Africa’s government has announced that it will appeal the country’s recent High Court ruling which decriminalized private, small-scale cannabis cultivation and consumption on a personal level.
On March 31st, the Western Cape High Court stated that the ban on cannabis in its present form was not constitutional. As a result of that decision, the government of the country was ordered to change the narcotics act to allow for the non-public consumption and private cultivation of cannabis. The government and parliament were given two years to legally anchor the court’s verdict.
Cannabis supporters celebrated the verdict immediately after its promulgation as a historic victory. But now, several government officials and the country’s law enforcement agencies have announced their intention to appeal within the statutory deadline. Despite lofty title, South Africa’s Western Cape High Court is not the highest authority in South Africa. A verdict may be appealed to the Supreme Court of Appeal or the Constitutional Court of Appeal.
In their reasoning, government representatives argued that the High Court has only referred to the right to privacy, although this…
