Land Reform: Election Ploy or Real priority?
Is there a single sensible person in South Africa who does not believe that the extension of property rights to all South Africans is both necessary and desirable?
And is there a single sensible South African who believes that the current flurry of activity around land reform will lead to real progress in the near future? Perhaps many years of political participation by this writer have led to a certain cynicism, but the whole debate, initiated by the ANC and the EFF, smells strongly of electoral politics aimed at lulling voters into a sense that this time might be different. I have written about this before and make no apology for doing so again.
One of the biggest failures of the government over the past quarter of a century is land reform. The constitutional imperative to broaden land ownership, clearly recognised and provided for in clause 25 of the Constitution has not been honoured to anything like the extent it should have been if this was a real ANC priority. Do you remember a few years ago President Zuma announced that henceforth the “willing buyer/willing seller” principle would not be observed because it was deterring land reform? Precisely nothing happened that sped up land reform thereafter because the truth is that this was not a “principle” at all and the government has always had the right to expropriate property for public purposes. It was an excuse.
Now we have come to the cry for expropriation without compensation (EWC). The excuse is that because of the provision of Clause 25 of the Constitution, providing for just and equitable compensation, land reform has stalled. Another excuse and also untrue. It is clear that the clause would permit EWC if this was just and equitable.
What it would not do is permit unjust and inequitable action because that amounts to theft. For some in the ANC and in the EFF, promoting the theft of property from white people has an attractive ring about it and it is designed to appeal to people who have nothing. It is then explained on the basis that whites stole the land from blacks and therefore EWC is justified.