The battle over farmers stepping in to try and eradicate foot-and-mouth disease is turning to court on Tuesday.
Image: File
The legal battle over the private production and use of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) vaccine will turn to the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria this week after mediation between the parties to try and get common ground, failed.
Livestock farmers, Sakeliga, the Suider-Afrika Agri Inisiatief (Saai) and Free State Agriculture (the applicants) will apply for an interdict against the government's obstruction of private-sector procurement and administration of FMD vaccines.
Sakeliga and other parties last week participated in a court-prescribed mediation with the government, which was unsuccessful. Subsequent to this Tuesday’s court hearing concerns the first stage of the legal battle.
The court will be asked to issue an interdict restraining the state from blocking private individuals and entities from administering registered or authorised FMD vaccines to livestock. It will also be asked to prohibit the state from interfering in the contractual relationships between those who legally import the vaccine and their suppliers.
A review application, constituting the second stage, will follow at a later stage. This review application will include asking for declaratory relief confirming that there exists no impediment to owners or managers of livestock administering the vaccine, alternatively reviewing and setting aside any such legal impediment that may exist or be created.
The applicants said the application follows the failure by the Minister of Agriculture, John Steenhuisen, to provide a lawful basis for his prohibition on private-sector vaccine procurement and administration, and the detrimental interference by agricultural officials in private vaccine import agreements.
“The Minister's insistence on state control of all aspects of FMD vaccination, in contrast to the common practice of private procurement and administration of livestock vaccination for other diseases, has caused widespread distress and significant production losses across the agricultural sector,” Anton Meijer of Sakeliga said.
According to him, nothing in their application would obstruct the minister or other officials from carrying out their lawful duties and efforts at combating foot-and-mouth disease.
“If we are successful, however, farmers and others will immediately be free to vaccinate not only cattle but also other livestock at their own discretion and with their own resources, with reporting for tracking purposes as may be required".
Their application comes in the wake of the FMD crisis which is crippling farmers. They claim that the state has failed to effectively contain the spread, and that they should be given the freedom to take matters into their own hands. After President Cyril Ramaphosa’s State of the Nation Address classifying the foot and mouth disease as a National Disaster, a Government Gazette was issued declaring a National Disaster.
Steenhuisen meanwhile recently warned that the litigation could derail the national FMD vaccination rollout and divert critical veterinary and financial resources away from outbreak control. He said in a statement that FMD is a state-controlled disease governed by the Animal Diseases Act and that a strictly centralised vaccination programme is required to regain South Africa’s “FMD-free status with vaccination” from the World Organisation for Animal Health.
He also cautioned against what he described as reckless calls for unrestricted access to vaccines. But the applicants say he failed to substantiate his prohibitions on private sector vaccine procurement and administration, and his department’s interference obstructed and delayed private sector vaccine imports.
zelda.venter@inl.co.za