Based in Nieuw Muckleneuk, Pretoria, Ledwaba Mazwai is a motivated and hardworking team of lawyers, administrative and support staff. We are committed to providing services of consistent high professional standards without compromising on the quality of our work and commitment to our clients. Ledwaba Mazwai was established in 1996 in pursuit of the ideal to build a successful black commercial law firm. Today, our firm has become a symbol of pride, excellence and the capabilities of black legal practitioners as a collective.

Our history

In the early nineties, as a result of the marginalisation and discriminatory practices that are part of our history, black lawyers in South Africa were confined to the areas of matrimonial law, criminal law and personal injury matters. Despite these challenges, two young law students shared an aspiration of creating a black-owned and operated commercial law firm – a pioneering firm that would provide an uncompromised standard of commercial legal services to compete with the established white law firms of the time.

Founding partners

Two young visionaries, Metja Ledwaba and Lungile Mazwai, were determined to establish what would become a dynamic law firm, in order to showcase the capabilities and excellence of black legal practitioners in areas of legal practice they were historically excluded from. It was this ideal that saw the founding partners of Ledwaba Mazwai receiving their training in established law firms. This would give them a solid grounding in commercial law practice and in managing and providing legal services to government, institutional and corporate clients.

Left: Metja Ledwaba | Right: Lungile Mazwai

Our achievements

Since the launch of our firm in 1996, we have:

• developed an excellent track record in providing legal services to corporate, institutional, public sector and Government in the areas of law in which we practice;
• developed a solid practice in general commercial law, commercial litigation, labour law, tax, administrative and constitutional law;
• become one of the leading law firms in major infrastructure projects including those carried out as Public Private Partnership and Independent Power Producer projects;
• developed templates for and advising in the BBBEE, Local Content and Skills Development (“Economic Development”) in major infrastructure and other procurement programmes for Public Sector;
• assisted in developing and taking to market of major projects for Government, in relation to restructuring of state-owned enterprises, Public Private Partnerships, Independent Power Producer projects and other infrastructure development projects. These include services provided to government departments locally and in the SADC region;
• attained a good standing and reputation with professional service providers in other professional disciplines, with whom we worked on major projects, for our ability to successfully interface the finance, technical and legal matters through the project documents;
• developed and secured the technology, professional and support staff to service our clients;
• provided empowering and dynamic general legal services to state-owned enterprises; and
• become a symbol of pride and aspiration for black legal practitioners in the areas of our expertise.

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”Aristotle