LAND REDISTRIBUTION
Pledge of precolonial audit is a way to distract from fruits of patronage
President Jacob Zuma’s "radical" solution to the lack of meaningful land redistribution is to assure traditional leaders the government will expedite a precolonial land audit. How this will provide land and security of tenure to shack dwellers around the cities and to people who need land in rural areas is unclear. It is also not clear how the government will pull off such an audit, given its failure to complete an audit of all the land currently owned by state institutions, despite repeated undertakings to do so. That audit is increasingly urgent given the government’s policy to make land reform beneficiaries perpetual tenants of the state with "institutional use rights" rather than ownership. Nor has the state completed an audit of privately owned land, despite repeated promises to do so over the past 20 years. Under this new policy of state leasehold, the state will retain the ownership of "redistribution" land, in addition to the land it already owns in former homeland and other...
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.
Subscribe now to unlock this article.
Support BusinessLIVE’s award-winning journalism for R129 per month (digital access only).
There’s never been a more important time to support independent journalism in SA. Our subscription packages now offer an ad-free experience for readers.
Cancel anytime.
Questions? Email helpdesk@businesslive.co.za or call 0860 52 52 00. Got a subscription voucher? Redeem it now.