GAUTENG
COMMENT, by Pete Bower
MAGAZINE
HOW TO MAKE YOUR PLOT PROFITABLE
Vol 19 No 4
April 2018
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FRONT COVER
Damara lamb. (Picture - Damara Sheep
Breeders Society of SA)
... read about Damara sheep inside
The land reform mess
T
here are a number of issues clouding the current land “problem”
in South Africa, not the least being that the problem is not one
problem, but a number of problems that have been conflated by
the politicians for their own rhetorical convenience, and which have, as a result,
confused and alarmed the general public.
For, to the man in the street, land invasions, land restitution, land reform and the most
recent bug-a-boo, expropriation without compensation, all appear to be the same
thing: frightening strands in the same tangled ball of wool.
So, let's shed some light on the issues involved by discussing the various elements and
some of the observations made by economists, agrarians and sundry commentators.
At the outset let's be clear that expropriation, with or without compensation, is already
part of our law, and has been for generations, just as it is in most countries. But it exists
to help the state or local authorities to provide necessary infrastructure such as roads,
hospitals or dams. The state has within its powers the right to simply take the land
needed, for the greater good of the general population, although generally it pays
compensation, related in some measure to the land's market value. That's expropria-
tion, and in the extreme case (and under the apartheid era Group Areas Act), without
compensation, or EWC, as it has come to be called.
But that should not be confused with what the EFF and its new-found fellow-travellers
in the ANC propose, which is expropriation without compensation , of “property,” with
the idea of redistributing it to previously disadvantaged people. In the EFF's version of
this process, the expropriatees (ie, those whose property will be expropriated) will be
white. Full stop.
Depending on how much you trust politicians generally, and the ANC in particular, you
can form your own opinion as to whether this will devolve into a wholesale Zimbabwe-
style land-grab benefiting only the black elite and well-connected, or be something
more measured and protective of the economy, jobs and food security.
But the EFF’s proposal should not be confused with land occupation , tried last month
by hopeful shack dwellers in Midrand, Pretoria East and elsewhere, where hundreds of
people suddenly converge on a piece of land and begin staking claims, often having
parted with hard-earned cash to some persuasive “entrepreneur” (who may or may not
be a rogue member of a political party).
Then there is the subtle difference between land reform and land restitution . Reform
should include, for example, the management of land to integrate established apart-
heid-era townships into their associated formerly “white” towns, by proclaiming linking
industrial, commerial or residential developments, upgrading facilities etc. Restitution is
the handing over of land to previously-dispossessed individuals or communities.
But the entire land reform/restitution issue is fraught with disagreement even as to the
necessary starting point. For example, during the worst apartheid years black, Indian
and coloured families were forcibly removed under the Group Areas Act from areas
such as District Six and Wynberg in Cape Town, or Sophiatown in Johannesburg, and
dumped in Manenberg or Mitchell's Plain, or in Soweto, or in the bantustans. Members
of many of those families are still alive, still remember the hurt and indignity of those
removals, and still feel a sense of loss and deprivation.
But it goes back earlier than that. Another significant milestone was the 1913 Native
Land Act which at a stroke deprived vast numbers of black families of their land.
Obviously, anybody who was dispossessed at that stage is no longer alive and the entire
l andscape has changed vastly since that time.
But it goes back even earlier than that. Radicals in the ANC and EFF are now arguing
that it was in 1652 that the first dispossession of black land took place.
The fact is that even at this stage South Africa does not have one single land “owner-
ship” model, but many, ranging from freehold with title deeds, to tribal trusts, to
permissions to occupy (PTOs), to communal land ownership, with the question of
mining rights driving a legal cart and horses through the whole lot. Certainly a compli-
cating factor, particularly if you wish to take 1652 as your dispossession starting point.
But there are another two significant snags in this mess. Firstly, nobody knows for sure
who owns what land, and the government's own report on the subject is shot through
with inaccuracies, generalisations and false assumptions.
Just as it is false to assume that there is a universal “hunger for land” among black
people. In many cases hitherto in the ANC's land reform programme, when offered
land or money, the beneficiaries have taken the money rather than the land.
SAY YOU SAW IT IN THE GAUTENG SMALLHOLDER