LAND REFORM
Public interest should not determine ‘just and equitable compensation’ in SA
Land reform in SA has generated emotion close to hysteria among investors and political observers, both locally and abroad. The prickly issue is simply whether the government will recognise and give effect to the established principles of equitable compensation to the owner of redistributed property. For as long as section 25 of our Constitution requires "just and equitable compensation" to be paid for expropriated property, landowners can be assured that there can be no expropriation without just and equitable compensation. However, the issue now lies not in whether there will be expropriation without compensation, but rather whether the compensation will be determined by application of recognised principles of valuation. In other words, will "public interest" result in the amount of compensation being arbitrarily determined without cognisance of the true market value of the redistributed property? The vexing issue is the striking of an equitable balance between the public interest...
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