Expropriation of land without compensation will not come cheap, as some people would like to think, the provincial land summit was told during heated discussions on the thorny issue in East London on Thursday.
Attendees were participating in various commissions at the Eastern Cape Land Dialogue Summit, which was hosted by the provincial department of rural development and agrarian reform at the International Convention Centre.
The chair of the legal and policy perspective commission, Siyabulela Monana, warned that South Africans should not be misled that the planned expropriation of land without compensation would be of benefit to everyone.
“Expropriation can take much longer.
“Expropriation does not mean that it is going to be cheaper.
“When it is contested, you get into legal processes that may cost much more.
“Fighting these battles in court adds to the price,” he said.
Monana also lambasted the processes of willing buyer-willing seller, saying there were farmers who collaborated with officials to increase the prices of farms for their own benefit.
Speaking on the sidelines of the summit, Eastern Cape House of Traditional Leaders chair Nkosi Mwelo Nonkonyane said the process of expropriating land without compensation should be accelerated for the benefit of those who have been oppressed.
“The land that is called South Africa belongs to the people that occupied it before the colonialists came. This land belongs to all the people under the traditional leadership in South Africa,” he said.
Some of his comments were echoed by Xoleli Ngqameni, the Eastern Cape Farmers’ Association chair, who said the association supported the ANC’s resolution on land expropriation without expropriation.
“This position is the only way that people can get access to land and we support this.
“This summit is part of how we should expropriate this land,” he said.
The provincial secretary of the African Farmers’ Association of South Africa, Mzimkhulu Jikijela, said land should go back to the people as most black people didn’t have land.
“This is no more another talk show. At the end of this summit, we will have timelines to meet.
“However, this process can never be accelerated by one sector. We need traditional leaders, NGOs, government departments, farmers and others to come together for this to work,” he said...