If you are involved in a criminal or civil case in a Magistrate’s Court, you can ask the High Court to look at the decision of the Magistrate’s Court and decide whether it was correct. This is called an appeal. If you want to appeal against a decision of a Magistrate’s Court, you must first get permission to appeal from that Magistrate’s Court. This permission is called ‘leave to appeal‘. If this permission is refused, you can ask the High Court itself for permission to appeal.

If you think that the proceedings in the Magistrate’s Court were unfair or not according to the law, you can ask the High Court to review the case. Reviews happen automatically in certain circumstances. In other cases, you have to ask for a review.

Reviews happen automatically in certain circumstances, for example, when an accused represented himself in the criminal trial. In other cases, you have to ask for a review.

(See: Trials, Appeals and Reviews)