It’s been an eventful week on the Expropriation without Compensation front.

Now that the Constitutional Court has ruled that the local government election must be held between 27th October and 1st November 2021, parliamentary proceedings are to be paused from (10th September) until 2nd November (after the local poll). 

Now that the Constitution 18th Amendment Bill has been formally tabled and is on the National Assembly’s order paper under “further business”, a few facts need to be highlighted. No biased commentary or speculation.

In September 2021 a new opinion poll commissioned by the IRR showed that only 5% of South Africans think land reform should be one of the two top priorities for the government to address.

It’s now almost 25 years after the end of apartheid and the land question inside Africa’s most powerful economy still remains largely unresolved.

As the year winds down, and with it emotional and intellectual energy, it is important not to forget that politics and governance continues apace.

Communities living on the boundaries of the Kruger National Park in Mpumalanga and Limpopo, who have lodged land claims on parts of the park, are not happy that a beneficiation scheme that could see them profit from the park's commercial activities is still not finalised almost five years after the settlement of their claims.

The outbreak of COVID-19 and a challenging economic environment which has resulted in budgetary cuts and re-allocation of resources to other priority areas, has impacted negatively on SA’s land reform programme, says the Vumelana Advisory Fund (Vumelana), a non-profit organisation that supports land reform beneficiaries.

TLU SA is grateful that the proposed amendment to Article 25 of South Africa's Constitution about the expropriation of property without compensation was not voted in.

Tuesday’s defeat of the constitutional amendment for expropriation without compensation – the 204 votes for and 145 against missed the two-thirds threshold of 267 – was on the cards for a while, as  already reported in July. 

This does have an economic impact.

On Saturday, 8 January 2022, the African National Congress (ANC) will celebrate its 110th anniversary.

I believe it is inevitable that, with the continuing economic crises engulfing South Africa, the government will look for ways to relieve public pressure and divert attention away from its myriad failures during the pandemic and the disastrous lockdowns which have hamstrung the economy and worsened food insecurity, joblessness and social instability.

Expropriation Without Compensation – have South Africa’s citizens merely dodged the bullet? 

Humans have hunted Africa’s animals since the dawn of time, but the arrival of European guns in the 17th century changed the scale of predation.

Now that the ANC’s attempt to rewrite the property clause (Section 25) in the Constitution has been defeated, the ruling party plans to achieve its expropriation-without-compensation (EWC) objectives via the Expropriation Bill of 2020 and the Land Court Bill of 2021. 

For most agricultural subsectors, South Africa is emerging from one of the best years.

Now that the ANC’s attempt to rewrite the property clause (Section 25) in the Constitution has been defeated, the ruling party plans to achieve its expropriation-without-compensation (EWC) objectives via the Expropriation Bill of 2020 and the Land Court Bill of 2021. 

TLU SA takes note of the ANC’s legotla idea of ​​taxation on unused land, to make more land available for its transformation agenda - but at the same time calls on the ANC to explain what it means by unused land.

Agri SA welcomes the judgment delivered in the Land Claims Court on 11 February 2022 by Judge Cowen in the compensation dispute between the Minister of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development and the owners of the subdivisions of the farm Jakkelsdans.