South Africa: Civil society back in court over state’s failure to protect clinic access

The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), Doctors Without Borders (MSF), and Kopanang Africa Against Xenophobia (KAAX) – represented by SECTION27 – filed an urgent contempt application after state authorities failed to comply with a High Court order issued on 4 December 2025 to restore safe and unhindered access to the Yeoville and Rosettenville clinics in Johannesburg. The matter will be heard today, 16 March, at the South Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg at 10am.

The application follows an order granted by Justice Wilson in December 2025 directing the facility managers at the Yeoville and Rosettenville clinics, the City of Johannesburg, the Gauteng Department of Health and others, to take immediate and concrete steps to ensure that patients can access healthcare services at these facilities.

It requires that such access occur without intimidation or obstruction.

In the previous hearing, undisputed facts established that the two clinics in this application had become sites of significant vigilante activity. Unidentified groups were controlling access to the clinics and preventing patients from entering unless they could produce South African identity documents. Among those turned away were pregnant women, breastfeeding mothers and young children: individuals who are widely recognised as deserving special protection in the provision of healthcare services.

In the months since the order was granted, TAC, MSF, and KAAX have conducted monitoring and have found vigilante groups at the clinics, particularly at Rosettenville clinic. These groups continue to pose a threat to patients seeking healthcare. There has been no visible or sustained intervention by authorities to prevent vigilantism or ensure that patients can safely enter the clinics.

The civil society organisations bringing this case have repeatedly attempted to engage the respondents to resolve the issue without further litigation. However, the ongoing obstruction of access to healthcare and the lack of meaningful engagement from authorities left them with no choice but to return to Court.

In today’s hearing, the applicants will ask the Court to declare the first to fifteenth respondents to be in contempt of the December 2025 order, alternatively to declare that they are in breach of that order. The applicants also seek further mandatory relief requiring the respondents to take immediate steps to comply fully with the Court’s orders.

The applicants emphasise that this case concerns both the protection of vulnerable patients and the rule of law. Court orders must be respected and implemented. Without effective enforcement, the rights of patients, including migrants and undocumented South Africans, remain at risk, and the authority of the courts is undermined.

Ensuring safe access to healthcare is not optional. It is a constitutional obligation.

Jane Rabothata

Communications Specialist, Doctors Without Borders

• jane.rabothata@joburg.msf.org
• 0712873613

About Doctors Without Borders (MSF)

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) is a global network of principled medical and other professionals who specialise in medical humanitarian work, driven by our common humanity and guided by medical ethics. We strive to bring emergency medical care to people caught in conflicts, crises, and disasters in more than 70 countries worldwide.

In South Africa, we currently run a non-communicable diseases (NCDs) project in Butterworth, Eastern Cape province, where we support the Department of Health (DoH) in improving care for patients with diabetes and hypertension. The project focuses on improving screening, diagnosis, management, and prevention of NCDs through advocacy, research, health promotion, training, and mentorship of Community Healthcare Workers.

MSF is also recognised as one of the pioneers in providing antiretroviral treatment (ART) in the public sector. It started the first HIV programme in South Africa in 1999. The organisation's earlier interventions in the country have primarily been on developing new testing and treatment strategies for HIV/AIDS and Tuberculosis (TB) in Eshowe (Kwa-Zulu Natal) and Khayelitsha (Western Cape). The Eshowe project was handed over to DoH in 2023 after 12 years of operations. The Khayelitsha project was closed in 2020 after 22 years of activities and campaigning for improved HIV and TB treatment.

Other projects we have been involved in include our Migrant Project in the country's capital, Tshwane, which was handed over to authorities and a local Community-Based Organisation after building the capacity to work with undocumented populations. We also previously offered free, high-quality, and confidential medical care to survivors of sexual and gender-based violence in Rustenburg, North West province.

To learn more about our work in South Africa, please visit this page on our website (www.msf.org.za). To support MSF’s work: