The Constitutional Court has ruled in favour of the City of Tshwane in its drive to remove 25 apartheid-era street names in Pretoria and replace them with those who fought for the liberation of the city. The court upheld an appeal by the city against an interim order granted by the high court in 2013 which restrained the municipality from removing street and road signs bearing the old names of streets pending a review application by Afriforum.In 2013‚ Judge Bill Prinsloo also ordered the city to restore and replace signs bearing the old names within two months.The city unsuccessfully appealed this judgment before a full bench of the high court and the Supreme Court of Appeal. The Constitutional Court set aside the judgment of Judge Prinsloo‚ and said an interim interdict should not have been granted in this case.The case has its genesis in September 2012 when the city council resolved to change the street names in Pretoria and adopt new public participation policy guidelines for the process of renaming streets.In a majority judgment‚ Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng said having solicited a diversity of views‚ including those of Afriforum and other residents‚ the council had resolved – as it was empowered – to replace the identified old street names.Mogoeng said the high court nevertheless granted an order restraining the council from implementing its decision also directing it to reinstate old names at the cost of R2.6-million.“An interim interdict in this instance should in these instances be granted in the rarest of cases. Intrusion into the sphere of operation reserved only for the other arms of state is an exercise not to be unreflectingly or over-zealously carried out by a court of law‚” Mogoeng said.Mogoeng said the sum total of Afriforum’s case was the harm it was exposed to by the gradual loss of place or sense of belonging.“The sense of place and sense of belonging contended for by Afriforum is highly insensitive to the sense of belonging of other cultural or racial groups.“It is divisive‚ somewhat selfish and does not seem to have much regard for the centuries-old deprivation of ‘a sense of place and a sense of belonging’ that black people have had to endure‚” Mogoeng said.Mogoeng said Afriforum and its constituency did not have the right to have the old street names they treasured displayed in perpetuity.“The only right Afriforum‚ like all other residents‚ has is to participate meaningfully in a properly facilitated process leading up to the change of street names.“And old street names may still be reinstated if the outcome of the review proceedings be that the public participation process was for example not only obligatory … or was a sham‚” Mogoeng said. – TMG Digital..