Mountain Reach Technologies v Mampudima Community Company and Another (061917/2025) [2025] ZAGPJHC 521 (2 June 2025)

IN THE HIGH COURT OF SOUTH AFRICA

GAUTENG LOCAL DIVISION,
JOHANNESBURG

CASE
NO: 061917/2025

DATE:
15-05-2025

REPORTABLE:
YES / NO.

(2)
OF INTEREST TO OTHER JUDGES: YES / NO.

(3)
REVISED.

In
the matter between

MOUNTAIN
REACH TECHNOLOGIES (PTY) LTD    Applicant

and

MAMPUDIMA COMMUNITYCOMPANY
NPC            
First Respondent

AFRICAN RAINBOW MINERALS
LIMITED              
Second Respondent

JUDGMENT

YACOOB,
J:

The applicant in this matter seeks an
urgent application compelling the respondents to return to it a
proposal and associated documentation
which the applicant provided in
the course of what it characterises as the conclusion of an agreement
between the parties. The
proposal was provided to the respondents in
August 2023. The documentation was provided without first obtaining
any undertakings
with regard to the confidentiality of the
documentation.

The applicant sent numerous agreements
to the respondents requesting them to be signed. These were never
signed. The agreements
for which signatures were unsuccessfully
requested include a confidentiality agreement. In the course of the
year-and-a-half since
the documents were provided to the respondents,
there has been interaction between the parties, characterised
primarily by the
applicant asking for an update and asking for the
respondents to sign the agreements, and the respondents asking for
more time
and essentially fobbing off the applicant.

In January this year, after the last
written interaction being in March 2024, the applicant received an
email recalling a meet and
greet request from the second respondent,
in response to which the applicant then asked for a meeting on 17
January. The applicant
received no response to that. The applicant
did nothing for a month and then imposed an ultimatum that the
respondents must respond
to them by 1 March, failing which they would
consider their position.

In all of this correspondence, the
applicant never asked for its documentation to be returned. It was
asking for the implementation
of the agreement which the applicant
claims has been concluded between the parties. When there was no
response by 1 March, the
applicant still did nothing and a month
after the applicant’s request for a meeting by 1 March, on 16 April,
the respondents published
a tender requesting services for training
which was part of the proposal provided by the applicants.

The applicants then sent further
correspondence to the respondents to the effect that they considered
themselves to be the service
provider and that the respondents must
finalise these agreements, failing which the applicant would take its
steps. In none of
this correspondence and in none of these demands
did the applicant refer to the documentation and ask for its return.

The applicants then initiated these
proceedings in which the first relief sought after the order
regarding urgency, is the interdict
of the use of the applicant’s
intellectual property contained in those documents; the return of the
documents, and the deletion
thereof from the respondents’
electronic devices. This was the first time that that relief was
sought.

There is absolutely nothing in the
facts before me which indicate why in those circumstances that relief
is urgent. There is no
indication that the first and second
respondents have used improperly or in any other way the intellectual
property and that they
have an intention of disseminating it. There
is therefore no threat to that intellectual property. The applicant
contends that
it is entitled to the relief, because the respondents
did not tender the return of the documents in response to this
application.

It is true that if the respondents are
not using the documents, it would have been better for them to simply
tender the return of
the documents and leave it at that. However, the
applicant cannot dictate how the respondent must respond to an
application and
there is more than one legitimate course of action
for a respondent to take. It is entirely within the rights of the
first and
second respondents to simply deny that they have done
anything with that documentation and to oppose the contentions of
urgency.

For these reasons, I do not find that
the matter is urgent. The respondents have used two counsel. I tend
to agree with the submission
of Ms Martin for the applicant that the
matter did not require the use of two counsel and therefore I do not
include that in the
costs order. For these reasons, I make the
following order:

ORDER

THE APPLICATION IS STRUCK FOR WANT
OF URGENCY AND THE APPLICANT IS TO PAY THE COSTS ON SCALE C.

YACOOB, J

JUDGE OF THE HIGH COURT

DATE:
……………….