The fight between an Eastern Cape traditional leader and some of her subjects over a piece of land will be decided by the court in April.
This comes as Princess Nomaxhosa Jongilanga has served Ncera Village 5 residents with an order evicting them from a contentious piece of land on which the residents have built shacks.
The East London High Court earlier this month granted Jongilanga an interim court order in terms of which the villagers had 30 days (until April 18) to vacate the land.
Jongilanga and her subjects will be back in court on April 16, when the court is expected to rule on the protracted land battle that began in 2016.
While villagers have vowed not to move from the land of their “forefathers”, Jongilanga said alternative land had been made available for them, as the one where they are living was “illegally occupied” and was reserved for livestock grazing – and not residential purposes.
On Thursday, about 100 villagers picketed on the disputed land. Sityu Ngqana said their shacks had been “unlawfully demolished” on what he said was their rightful land.
“She [Jongilanga] destroyed our homes and parents’ graves. She has not been to court, or to our meetings.”
Another villager, Nolungile Simayile, echoed the sentiments. “She destroyed our homes and did not rebuild them. We were born here; this is the land of our forefathers.”
Simayile was referring to an occasion in 2018 when Jongilanga demolished shacks after the court ruled the villagers had violated a 2017 order by continuing to build on the land.
Villagers also accuse Jongilanga of halting sand and sabhunga mining which they say had benefited them – an allegation vehemently denied by the traditional leader.
Sylvia Kapu said Jongilanga had attracted the ire of residents after she stopped the extraction of sand and sabhunga from two quarries in the village. “The land benefited the community. She wants all of that to herself. She stopped trucks that we sold to from coming here and said she is investing in this land.”
However, Jongilanga said she had only exercised her traditional powers to ensure lawlessness was not the order of the day.
“We had all these rampant land invasions where people sold land clearly not demarcated for residential purposes. This started in 2016 and we went to all nine villages to stop this illegal activity.
"Our [traditional] council resolved to approach a lawyer in 2016 and in October 2017 brought an interim court order saying people should stop demarcating sites, and whoever was found doing that, would be removed. No one opposed [it].”
She said the traditional council offered people an alternative piece of land inside the village which residents refused. “In mid-2018, we saw Ncera Village 5 [residents] selling sites on the very same space, and those fields are for grazing purposes and we stopped them.
“We asked them to look for sites inside the village, but as soon as they heard that Eskom would install electricity, they marked their own sites near the road.”
When asked about the quarry, she said: “Minerals of the village cannot benefit one area. There can’t be any exchange of money for minerals without any partners having a licence for mining. The money has to go towards village projects.”..