Willie van Wyk is a practising consultant in our Commercial Litigation Department. Willie has extensive experience in High and Magistrate’s Court litigation as well as alternative dispute resolution with an emphasis on insurance law. After working in the Department of Justice as a prosecutor and spending time with Southern Oil Exploration as a legal advisor, he joined Hofmeyr (now Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr) in 1983, was admitted in 1985 and became a Director in 1987. Willie became a fulltime consultant with Malatji & Co in April 2020.

Notably, Willie acted for a major short-term insurer in South Africa at the Melamet Commission of Enquiry into Third Party Insurance. He also acted for the South African Football Association, Premier Soccer League and Clubs on instructions of a major short-term insurer at the Commission of Enquiry into the Ellis Park Stadium Soccer Disaster in 2001. Willie was the attorney of record for the Minister of Safety and Security in the reported Constitutional Court judgment of Ex parte Minister of Safety and Security and Others: In Re: S V Walters and Another 2002 (7) BCLR 663 (CC) in which the constitutionality of section 49(2) of the Criminal Procedure Act No 51 of 1977, was found to be inconsistent with the Constitution and invalid. Willie regularly acts for well-known insurers in successfully defending or mitigating substantial claims by both local and overseas claimants.

In a recent matter, he acted for a domestic airline in a novel action instituted by a competitive airline pursuant to a Certificate of Decision issued by the Competition Tribunal pertaining to a prohibited practice of the abuse of dominance.

Recently, Willie was named in the Best Lawyers List for 2020 as one of South Africa’s foremost insurance lawyers and Chambers Global ranked Willie in Band 3 in the insurance category for 2020.