The Supreme Court of Appeal has rejected the ANC's attempt to appeal against a court victory for the DA over the practice of cadre deployment. Unless the ruling party tries to approach the Constitutional Court, it now has five days to hand over its cadre deployment records.

The DA's court challenges to the ANC practice of cadre deployment are gathering momentum -- as the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) ruled on Monday that the ANC could not appeal against an earlier loss in the high court on the matter.

The ANC had approached the appellate court in the hope of overturning a February 2023 ruling in the Johannesburg High Court which directed the ANC to provide the DA with its internal records pertaining to cadre deployment within five court days.

The SCA has now dismissed the ANC's bid in this regard, on the grounds that "there are no reasonable prospects of success in an appeal and there is no other compelling reason why an appeal should be heard".

Schreiber's mission

It is the indefatigable DA MP Leon Schreiber who has taken aim squarely at cadre deployment: the practice that sees the ANC convene a kind of internal appointments committee to discuss filling vacancies in the public service, ideally with loyal ANC members.

Schreiber has already succeeded in having the minutes from the ANC's deployment committee between 2018 and 2020 made public. Arguably the biggest bombshell to come out of those minutes was the revelation that the...