Who are the Davids who took on Goliath govt over lockdown?

Reyno de Beer took on government and won.

Last month, De Beer and the Liberty Fighters Network – of which De Beer is the founder and president – waged what they describe as a “David and Goliath” style war against the lockdown regulations.

They decided to take Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to court over them. The case was argued before Judge Norman Davis in the High Court in Pretoria last week.

On Tuesday, Davis declared the regulations unconstitutional and invalid and gave Cabinet 14 days to remedy the defects.

But who are De Beer and the Liberty Fighters Network?

On its website, the group describes itself as “a contemporary fundamentalist voluntary association group forming a common law universitas with perpetual succession, with legal status separate from its members. It is a group not for gain and its assets and liabilities are held in its own name”.

It says it is “fighting for the right to equal justice for all”.

De Beer yesterday told The Citizen the organisation was started five years ago and that its focus was on assisting with landlord-tenant disputes.

“We’re not big. We don’t have any big financiers,” he said. “We operate only at a grassroots level.”

They went to court after receiving “roughly 3,000 complaints from aggrieved tenants who were being totally abused by their landlords”.

“We tried to get the police to assist but they weren’t able to – or didn’t want to,” De Beer said. “That made us realise that government didn’t think this through and so we decided to go to court.”

A family man, De Beer said the lockdown had also affected him on a personal level and that he wanted to set an example for his two young daughters.

Going into court last week, De Beer and his team were confident.

“We were really hoping and believing that we had a good case,” he said.

They were “absolutely ecstatic” with the outcome and De Beer said it was not only a victory for the group but “a win for all South Africans”.

“It was also a team effort – involving people of different cultures, religions and beliefs.

“That was what made it all the more special for us to win,” he said.

De Beer said he hoped the judgment would encourage others.

“Our organisation works to empower people to enforce their rights in court, even when they don’t have the luxury of being able to afford legal practitioners,” he said.

“I truly hope that people will now realise that the law is our friend and that the courts are our friend.”

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