Former Miss SA contestant waits months for deportation ruling as court seeks guidance

Chidimma Adetshina, the former Miss SA contestant facing deportation, will not learn the outcome of her case until February 2027. The Cape Town Regional Court announced the postponement on Wednesday, citing the need for clarity from a higher court before it can proceed.

The delay is procedural. The High Court must first rule on Adetshina’s review application challenging Home Affairs’ decision to deport her. Until that determination is made, Magistrate Reema Khorana explained, the Regional Court cannot move forward with its own judgment.

In the meantime, Adetshina’s daily life remains tightly constrained. She is bound to a single address and must report regularly to an immigration officer. Those conditions stay in place through the months ahead as the case winds through the courts, a stretch of uncertainty that now extends well into 2027.

The postponement drew an immediate reaction outside the courtroom. Protesters from March and March and Operation Dudula gathered there on Wednesday, expressing frustration with the decision to delay judgment. Their presence underscored how closely the public has been tracking a case that has already attracted significant protest activity.

The structure of the legal challenge creates the current impasse. Adetshina’s review application at the High Court takes procedural priority over the Regional Court proceedings. The lower court cannot make determinations about detention or deportation until the higher court has addressed the fundamental question of whether Home Affairs acted properly in ordering her removal from South Africa. Only once that review concludes will the Regional Court have the legal footing to deliver its own ruling.

By contrast, the February 2027 date offers at least a fixed point on the horizon. By then, the High Court is expected to have delivered its ruling on the review application, clearing the way for the Regional Court to act. Whether that action will address questions of detention pending deportation, or other aspects of the case, depends entirely on what the High Court decides first.

Immigration cases of this kind move through layered judicial levels in sequence, with lower courts sometimes required to wait while higher courts establish the legal foundation beneath them. For Adetshina, that waiting period now runs through the remainder of 2026 and into the new year, with the February date the next moment that could meaningfully shift her circumstances.