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No Case, No Court Order: Settlement Agreements Without Litigation

Can a private settlement agreement be “clothed” with the authority of a court order even if no action or application was instituted? This question has practical importance: parties often wish to enforce settlement terms as if they were court judgments, avoiding the time and expense of a full trial. In South Africa and Namibia, however, the current legal position is that courts will generally not grant such an application. Recent judgments have clarified that a settlement agreement cannot be made an order of court if it wasn’t concluded in the context of pending litigation.