Is it considered unprofessional to have no black advocates working on a case?

Johannesburg Bar Council will discuss why black advocates are not receiving enough briefs to work on cases

JOHANNESBURG - The Johannesburg Bar Council is going to discuss tonight whether it should be considered unprofessional conduct to have a team of three advocates working on a case together if none of them are black.

It says that it needs to discuss this issue because black advocates are still not receiving enough briefs to work on cases.

Last week in an unprecedented move, black advocates argued in a mining silicosis case that it was wrong for there to be forty advocates involved with almost all of them being white men.

The council's chair advocate Dali Mpofu says there's only one reason why this keeps happening.

"In one word… it's just racism. It is based on the belief that black advocates are incompetent and are not suitable for large commercial matters and so on."

The council says it needs to do what it can to ensure that black advocates receive a fair number of cases.

It says it's clear that government and some companies just refuse to hire black advocates for important cases.

Mpofu says it's wrong that government is refusing to brief black advocates

"It's another manifestation of racism which is the belief in their own inferiority or what we call self-hate."