Page:Matrimonial Property Amendment Act 1986.djvu/2



Rh GENERAL EXPLANATORY NOTE

To amend the Matrimonial Property Act, 1984, so as to empower the Minister of Justice to extend the periods within which spouses to certain marriages may cause certain provisions of that Act to apply to their marriages; and to provide for incidental matters.

(Afrikaans text signed by the State President.) (Assented to 3 September 1986.)

E IT ENACTED by the State President and the Parliament of the Republic of South Africa, as follows:―

1. Section 21 of the Matrimonial Property Act, 1984 (hereinafter referred to as the principal Act), is hereby amended—

by the substitution for paragraph (a) of subsection (2) of the following paragraph:

Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in any law or the common law contained, but subject to the provisions of paragraphs (b) and (c), the spouses to a marriage out of community of property entered into before the commencement of this Act in terms of an antenuptial contract by which community of property and community of proﬁt and loss are excluded, may cause the provisions of Chapter I to apply in respect of their marriage by the execution and registration in a registry within two years after that commencement or such longer period, but not less than six months, determined by the Minister by notice in the Gazette, of a notarial contract to that effect;”; and

by the substitution for paragraph (c) of subsection (2) of the following paragraph:

For the purpose of proof of the net value of the respective estates of the spouses on the date on which the provisions of Chapter I so apply, they may declare that value either in the notarial contract concerned or [at any time within one year after the commencement of this Act] in a statement as contemplated in section 6, and in the last-mentioned case the provisions of the said section 6 apply mutatis mutandis in respect of that statement.”.

2. Section 25 of the principal Act is hereby amended by the substitution for subsection (2) of the following subsection: “(2) Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in any law or the common law contained, the spouses to a marriage, other than a marriage contemplated in subsection (1), entered into before the commencement of this Act may—