Nxaba v Nxaba

• Jurisdiction: South Africa
• Court: Appellate Division
• Judge: Innes CJ, Solomon JA, Wessels JA, JER De Villiers AJA and Stratford AJA
• Judgment Date: 01 April 1926
• Citation: 1926 AD 392
• Hearing Date: 01 April 1926

Innes, C.J.:

The action was brought by two exempted natives against their father for an account of the estate of their mother, whose intestate heirs they claimed to be. They alleged that, 10, years after the marriage of their parents by Christian rites, both parents obtained statutory letters of exemption, and they contended that the effect of those letters was to subject their parents to the common law, so as to bring their marriage within the operation of the doctrine of community. The allegations as to marriage and as to the issue of letters of exemption were admitted by the defendant, but all the allegations in the declaration were not admitted, nor had an agreed statement of facts been filed. Before the trial, the Natal Provincial Division, on the application of the plaintiffs, made an order by consent directing that the point of law whether the grant of letters of exemption to the defendant and his wife ten years after their marriage created any community of property between them either as to property then possessed by either of them or as to...