The court did not express a view on the merits of the dispute but instead held that the application did not engage its exclusive jurisdiction in terms of section 167 of the Constitution.

The Women's Legal Centre contended that its application met the criteria for direct access as set out in section 167 of the Constitution.

[2] In a unanimous judgment written by Justice Edwin Cameron, the Constitutional Court dismissed the application for direct access.

Cameron concluded of section 167(4)(e):Constitutional duties the state and its organs must perform collaboratively or jointly do not fall within its purview.

The fact that the obligation on which the Women's Legal Centre relies may encompass the President and Parliament amongst other state actors (a matter we do not decide now) is not sufficient to bring it within the exclusive jurisdiction of this Court.

It also deprived itself, the parties, and the public of other benefits of "multi-stage litigation", especially the opportunity to ventilate and clarify disputes of fact and of law.