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[1] The dispute in this application arises out the restoration to the Sakwa Dludla Community (‘the Dludla Community’) of 11 farms constituting 1 101.7752 hectares (‘the farms’). In terms of an order of the Land Claims Court handed down on the 18th September 2019, the Minister of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development was directed to acquire the farms for compensation, and to hold them in registered communal property trusts for the benefit of the Dludla Community. The farms were previously owned by the first to third respondents (and the trusts of which the fourth to sixth respondents were trustees).

[2] The applicants are trustees of the Isiziwe Sakwa Dludla Trust (‘the trust’), created to receive registration of the farms for the benefit of the Dludla Community. Only the first three applicants have brought this application, although all five of the current trustees are cited as applicants. I shall refer to the first three applicants as ‘the applicants’. The farms were all viable fruit and sugar cane farms, and the first to sixth respondents operated the farms in terms of a Memorandum of Understanding (‘the memorandum’), dated the 7th March 2020, which purports to have been concluded between the trust and the first to sixth respondents. It is the validity of the memorandum which is the central focus of this application.