A prisoner studying IT overturned an 18-year-old nationwide computer ban
Minister of Justice and Correctional Services and Others v Ntuli — Constitutional Court · (CCT 322/23) [2025] ZACC 7
What happened
Mbalenhle Ntuli, an inmate studying computer science, was blocked by a 2007 departmental policy from keeping a personal computer in his cell. The Constitutional Court upheld lower-court findings that the blanket, no-exceptions ban unjustifiably limited the right to further education under section 29(1)(b) of the Constitution.
Why it made the news
A single prisoner's case forced the reversal of a policy that had stood, unchallenged, for nearly two decades.
For lawyers & law students
Reinforces that a blanket rule restricting a constitutional right — with no case-by-case exception mechanism — is difficult to justify under section 36, even inside a prison's heightened security context. Correctional Services was given 12 months to draft a replacement policy; matters citing the old blanket ban should now argue it is no longer good law.
For citizens
Prisoners studying towards qualifications now have a stronger, court-backed basis to access personal computers for coursework, reshaping rehabilitation and education access in correctional facilities nationwide.