This piece, written in response to various articles published by IOL, was offered to, but not used by, IOL.
Since the announcement late last month that President Ramaphosa had assented to the Expropriation Act (without favouring the minister responsible for its implementation – or indeed his nominal coalition partners – with a heads-up that he was going to do so), the implications of this measure have been prominent in headlines.
This is as true for IOL as it has been for any platform.
Much of this has focused on the intervention of US President Donald Trump on the matter. His executive order referred to the “recent land confiscation act to seize disfavoured citizens’ property without compensation”, adding that “the government of South Africa blatantly discriminates against ethnic minority descendants of settler groups.” This predictably caused outrage, not least because some of its contentions are incorrect.
Accuracy is important in understanding the world, and addressing developments in it. This is true for politicians, and arguably even more so for journalists and public commentators. Unfortunately, many have failed in this as badly as President Trump.
Take, for example, the understanding of the Act. Echoing Trump, this has repeatedly been presented as a “land” measure. For example, Robin-Lee Franke (24 January) explains that the law sets out how “organs of State may expropriate land”, while Shamla Pather (10 February) describes the legislation as “aimed at providing a legal framework for the state to expropriate land.” They are hardly alone in this, on IOL or elsewhere – some commentators have even called it the Land Expropriation Act, with the capitalisation implying that this is its formal name. This is untrue. The Act is about the expropriation of property. It defines property as it is defined in section 25 of the Constitution, which unequivocally states: “property is not limited to land.”
The implications of this are profound. The Act is applicable to any asset that the state might take an interest in. This would include land (and land far beyond farming units), the buildings on it, shares, artworks, even savings and pension funds. Do not for a moment believe that this Act is irrelevant to you just because you don’t own a farm. Land constitutes a relatively small part of the capital and asset base of the country. There are far more tempting prizes that a hungry state and its collaborators would be interested in.
Land and land reform have, however, been idioms through which the drive for Expropriation without Compensation has been framed. This is unsurprising, as land dispossession raises painful historical memories. But here too, accuracy is necessary for informed debate and policy formation.
Impassioned plea
The contribution by Zamikhaya Maseti (5 February) makes an impassioned plea for race-inflected revolutionary change – and grounds it in an inaccurate rendering of information. Thus he says that “an Audit Report that was released by the then Minister of Rural Development and Land Reform in 2017 revealed that: 72% of agricultural land remains in white ownership; Africans own a mere 4%; people of colour [coloured people] own 15%; people of Indian origin own just 5%.”
These numbers refer to land held by individuals. This covers around a third of the country (and not all of it is actually agricultural). Most land in South Africa is owned by trusts (24%), the state (22%), companies (19%), community-based organisations (3%) and co-ownership schemes (1%). It is difficult if not impossible to assign a racial identity to land held in these arrangements.
Interestingly, and possibly deliberately, by focusing on individually titled freehold land, important realities are obscured. Firstly, land to which black people have historically had access – the former homelands – remains state land, with very little having been done to grant its residents actual ownership.
Secondly, land reform projects invariably retain land as state property (this is official policy, and there has been a strong bias against granting title to beneficiaries), or transfer it to ownership vehicles like trusts. As a rule, beneficiaries of land reform projects – who are generally not white – are not given individual freehold title and therefore do not appear in the racial breakdowns of individually titled freehold land, or in that notorious 72%-4% split. This is a nuance that needs honestly to be recognised, if changing ownership patterns are to be understood.
In redistribution projects, it has been official policy not to grant ownership. The case of David Rakgase, who had attempted to buy the state-owned farm he was operating, is revealing. The government initially agreed to sell him the property, but then fought a long and expensive court case to prevent him from buying it. Its court papers explained that its approach was based on the “principle that black farming households and communities may obtain 30-year leases, renewable for a further 20 years, before the state will consider transferring ownership to them”.
Opt for cash
Thirdly, many beneficiaries of land reform projects, when given the choice between receiving land or the equivalent value in cash, sensibly opt for cash, which can be used in far more ways than land can. Lives and circumstances have changed since the initial deprivations took place, and a piece of land may not be a useful asset. But these cash transfers, again, mean that the impact of land reform projects is invisible in the ownership statistics of individually titled freehold land.
In other words, land reform successes – modest though they may be – are effectively disappeared through the selective use of information.
Incidentally, calculations by economists Wandile Sihlobo and Johan Kirsten indicate that the scale of transfer since 1994 (including the often-ignored private acquisition of land) points to an effective redistribution of some 24% of farmland. They comment: “The incorrect presentation of the progress of the land reform process is also maliciously used to inflate the argument for expropriation. If South Africans are true to themselves and correctly report the statistics, then they will be much closer to the 30% target.”
And since Maseti focuses on agricultural land, it is worth pointing out that not all land is equally useful or valuable. From a developmental point of view, a dogged focus on the extent of ownership by different racial groups based purely on acreage is unhelpful and implies a lack of understanding of agriculture. A hectare of dry Karoo scrubland is not the same as a hectare of well-irrigated, fertile land in the high-rainfall eastern regions of South Africa.
Agri SA attempted to factor value and productive potential into ownership patters in a 2017 report. Their study found that “previously disadvantaged individuals” and the state held farmland equivalent to 29.1% of total value, and 46.5% of the country’s agricultural potential. Remember, for example, that much high-value agricultural land in KwaZulu-Natal is held by the Ingonyama Trust.
Tool to empower
Nor should South Africans be convinced by the subtext of Maseti’s piece – widely echoed – that the Act, or an expropriation drive, or expropriation without compensation, would be a tool to empower black people. There is very little in the conduct of the South African state to indicate that anyone would be free from the abuse that expanded powers would make possible.
In fact, even before the passing of the Act, black people haven’t been free from abuse. Think of the cases of Bheki Dlamini and the Mnyandu clan. In Dlamini’s case, a 3,000-hectare holding near Groutville was expropriated out from under him by the KwaDukuza Municipality in 2013. He was offered a mere R117 000 in compensation – he claimed his house alone was worth over half a million rand. In the Mnyandus’ case, their property in Ekuthuleni was invaded by armed men affiliated with a local traditional leader, himself allegedly linked to mining interests with an eye on the farm. Buildings were torched and the residents expelled. The police were on hand to assist – but only offered to escort the Mnyandus away, not to protect them from those intent on seizing their property without compensation.
All of this matters. It matters that we have accurate information to inform discussion and to come up with solutions as they exist, and not as we might assume they exist, or what we find convenient to exist. It matters especially in respect of matters that have emotional significance and that drive political divisions. And it matters for those who claim to care about the wellbeing and progress of all South Africans – since criticisms based on inaccuracies have no credibility.
[Image: https://www.flickr.com/photos/barbourians/14447394919]
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