Tembeka Ngcukaitobi

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Tembeka Nicholas Ngcukaitobi is a South African lawyer and legal scholar. He was born on 25 December 1976 in Cala, Transkei (now part of the Eastern Cape). He grew up in Lupapasi. His mother Nomsa worked as a domestic worker, and his father Gcinabantu Hutchinson was a mineworker and later a court clerk. His father died in 1983, and Ngcukaitobi has said this inspired him to pursue law.

He studied law at the University of Transkei, Rhodes University (LLM), and the London School of Economics (LLM). He also earned a BProc and LLB in 1999. He began his legal career at the Legal Aid Clinic in Mthatha and then at the Legal Resources Centre in Grahamstown, before working at Bowman Gilfillan from 2001 to 2010. In 2010 he joined the Johannesburg Bar as an advocate and later led the constitutional litigation unit at the Legal Resources Centre.

Ngcukaitobi is a senior advocate (silk), a status he received in February 2020. He is a member of the Judicial Service Commission and, since 2023, a part-time member of the Competition Tribunal. He has argued cases in the Constitutional Court for clients such as the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), and he has represented the Zondo Commission and President Cyril Ramaphosa in important matters. He was involved in the case at the International Court of Justice between South Africa and Israel. His work covers constitutional and public law, as well as competition, labour, and land law.

He has written two well-known books on land reform: The Land Is Ours (2018) and Land Matters (2021). These books critique how land has been owned and used in South Africa and argue for reform.

Ngcukaitobi has also served as a judge in the Labour Court, the Land Claims Court, and the High Court of South Africa. One notable early ruling about compensation for a labour tenant was later overturned on appeal. He has published academic articles and remained active in public debates about land reform and constitutional law.

In public service, he was a commissioner at the South African Law Reform Commission (2007–2011) and was appointed by President Ramaphosa to a land reform advisory panel in 2018. He served as president of the convocation of Walter Sisulu University (2019) and was appointed to the Judicial Service Commission in 2022. In 2023 he became a part-time member of the Competition Tribunal, and he declined a nomination to be Public Protector in 2023.