Some of these City by-laws have lingered on the books since the 19th century.
In a landmark move, the City published the By-law on the Repeal of By-laws that were Adopted by Former Municipalities, 2025, in the Provincial Gazette on Wednesday.
With this, 1 029 obsolete laws – some dating back to the 1890s – have now been scrapped.
Also, some of these bylaws addressed matters that are no longer applicable, or fall outside of local government’s mandate, for example radio antennas, traditional beer and guns, and firearms and explosions, the City said in a statement.
“This is the third and final by-law of its kind,” noted City Manager, Lungelo Mbandazayo.
“It took many years of thorough research to complete the investigation of all of the by-laws adopted over a period of more than 110 years by former municipalities that now make up the City of Cape Town,”
The by-law to repeal all by-laws
Before 1996, the City of Cape Town was made up of 30 separate small municipalities.
These were amalgamated into six larger municipalities – Helderberg, Tygerberg, Blaauwberg, South Peninsula, Oostenberg and the City of Cape Town.
In 2000, the six municipalities were dissolved to establish the City of Cape Town Metropolitan Municipality as it’s known today.
However, remnants of the fragmented system still lingered in legal form. To address this, the City began the process of repealing obsolete laws nearly two decades ago:
- In 2007, 514 by-laws were repealed.
- In 2016, another 302 were removed.
- Now, in 2025, the final 213 have been struck off.
“This process is now complete, and we can safely say there is not a single outdated or unconstitutional by-law left on our books,” added Mbandazayo.
Is this old legislation quirky or unconstitutional?
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