Land reform: restitution, not redistribution, is the proper vehicle
The proposed Regulation of Agricultural Land Holdings Bill violates the Constitution and rule of law
The disallowance of foreign ownership of agricultural land and the creation of a race and gender registry of landowners are among the proposals contained in the new Regulation of Agricultural Land Holdings Bill, sponsored by the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform. The Free Market Foundation has recently submitted its comment in which it points out that this violates the Constitution and the rule of law. The Bill is yet another in the list of redistributionist measures undertaken by the government in an attempt to take from some and give to others. Frédéric Bastiat called this "plunder". Redistribution in SA is a historical phenomenon, as tangible and identifiable areas of land were taken from black South Africans, and those areas must be given back to their rightful, identifiable owners. Restitution, not redistribution, is the proper vehicle for land reform the government should pursue. Bastiat wrote in his 1850 seminal work, The Law, that it "is very evident, then, tha...
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