LAND & AGRICULTURE: Speeding up the transfer
More money for redistribution but some doubters still fear the state retains smash-and-grab ambitions
Government has put its money where its mouth is on land restitution and redistribution, by allocating more than 50% of the department of rural development & land reform’s budget to the two functions. While ANC policy advocating expropriation of land without compensation is still a long way from becoming government policy, finance minister Malusi Gigaba’s budget address suggested efforts were being made to address it. President Cyril Ramaphosa has already indicated that the policy needs to be located within a "broad and comprehensive land redistribution and agricultural development programme". To this end, the department intends to accelerate finalisation of 2,851 land restitution claims over the next three years by allocating R10.8bn. A further R8.8bn will be allocated for land redistribution. The department’s total budget is R31bn. Theo Boshoff, legal intelligence manager at Agbiz, says that even if expropriation were already government policy, large sums of money would still be ne...
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