Abstract:
Section 2(1) of the Alienation of Land Act 68 of 1981 remains a bone of contention that
emerges, too often, in case law. Although the application of this Act entails more than the
mere purchase and sale of immovable property, its application is meticulously limited to
the sale, exchange or donation of a unit, a right to claim transfer of land, an undivided
share in land and for the purposes of chapters I and II of the Act, also any interest in land.
The aim of this article is to illustrate that if an alienation of land does not fall strictly
within the ambit of the above boundaries, the formality requirements of section 2(1) have
no bearing on the validity of the agreement. For this purpose, all recent cases dealing with
this topic are analysed to illustrate that the alienation of land can be achieved without
complying with the stringent formality prerequisites of section 2(1).
