The University of Pretoria's (UP) Moot Society teams were recently awarded as winners and runners-up of the 2021 17th Annual Kovsies First Year Moot Court Competition. 

This competition is coordinated and hosted by the Faculty of Law at the University of Free State. According to Kovsies: "The competition concentrates on current legal issues in children's law, family law, and customary law". 

The teams prepared rigorously in anticipation for the Final rounds of this competition in December 2021. After submission of memorials, they placed within the top 4 teams and qualified for the Semi-Final rounds. Thereafter, both teams won against the Tshwane University of Technology and Rhodes University to gain a place in the Finals – guaranteeing UP a win. Finally, Kate Metzer and Ruth Versfeld won the competition with Anthony Traicos and Oliver Kidd coming in second.

"Kovsies was a great experience. Both teams were very dedicated, and this is clearly shown by their achievements. It was amazing to see how each of them grew and developed as mooters and they are clearly a force to be reckoned with. In the end, it became a lovely competition between friends, and they promise that they have no bad blood. This is a competition that takes you back to the grassroots and teaches you the fundamentals of mooting", said coach Comfort Ayelomi. 

"Kovsies has been an incredible opportunity for growth. This competition focused on customary law and it was both informative and gratifying to have the chance to engage with this facet of the law. Competing alongside amazing speakers made this competition even more enjoyable and I would definitely recommend this experience," said runner-up Anthony Traicos.

"I thoroughly enjoyed Kovises. It was a great opportunity to not only develop my memorial writing but also my ability to present oral arguments. I learned so much about customary law which was very interesting," added team member Oliver Kidd.

Kate Metzer of the winning team noted that her Kovsies experience was educational and exciting, "Kovsies was a wonderful experience. I learned so much with regards to structuring written and oral arguments. It was an awesome experience to be judged by counsel and judges who are well versed in customary law. Definitely a fun and exciting experience!"

"My experience doing Kovises is something I will never forget. I will never forget the many days I spent reading cases and journal articles until my eyes were bloodshot, but I will also never forget the skills that I learnt in this competition. Skills of finding authority and building an argument that will be useful in my legal career. I also learned much about Customary Law which is an area of law that I had very little knowledge about. Now I can now safely say that if anyone wants to know something about Senior Traditional Leaders, they might be there for the next four hours while I explain. I am grateful that I was a part of this competition and thank you to the UP Moot Society for all of the support,” added teammate Ruth Versfeld. 

The team extends its gratitude to UP Law and the Moot Society for its support and enormous assistance.