The Kovsie Moot Court Competition was first hosted in 2005 as an initiative of the then Department of Procedural Law and Evidence. This competition is unique in that students argue for both the applicant/plaintiff and respondent/defendant before a panel of judges, retired judges, and senior legal representatives.

The rounds will be conducted in the Supreme Court of Appeal before a panel of judges consisting mostly of members of the judiciary. Six teams will go through to the final rounds. The team with the highest score will be the overall winning team. In addition, prizes are awarded to the best teams and best orator.

In addition, please note that in order to curb the problem of teams relying on professionally drafted heads of argument by practitioners, we decided to provide the hypothetical case on which the preliminary rounds will be based on the evening of the welcoming function.

This year we will again use a different set of facts for the final round of the competition, which will be provided to the qualifying teams the evening before the finals. We have taken this decision to further encourage you to achieve the objectives of the competition by levelling the playing field and trying to eliminate any foul play that can arise.

A basic knowledge of family law and law of persons is required to be able to successfully interpret the case based on hypothetical facts in the preliminary rounds.

Kovsie Moot Brochure 2019