Rightwing News: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5443599/White-South-African-farmers-removed-land.html Left Wing News: https://news.vice.com/en_us/article...paying-white-farmers-when-it-takes-their-land Neutral News: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...lve-land-issue-once-and-for-all-idUSKCN1GD4U4 What I think should have been done is that with the end or apartied, anyone that owned land before apartiad could not transfer the land by inhertence or sell it without state apporval to a state approved buyer, thus as all the old farmers die off the goverment could redistribute the land how ever works best.
It looks as if South Africa is replacing past oppression with new oppression. If land rights have no meaning then the land has no real value. Surely the government should be able to see how big of a mistake this will be.
And then we can look at reality of what they actually intend to do and how it affects everyone in South Africa, yet strangely, the media has decided to focus solely on the white farmers: EFF leader Julius Malema says commercial farming will be allowed to continue unabated, although land that is idle will be redistributed by the state, News24 reported on Wednesday night. Addressing reporters at the EFF's public healthcare campaign launch at Chris Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto on Wednesday evening, Malema elaborated on how the EFF views land expropriation without compensation. A majority of MPs in Parliament, including the ANC, voted in favour of a motion put forward by the EFF to review and if necessary change the Constitution to allow for the expropriation of land without compensation on Tuesday. The hype has focused on "expropriation of land without compensation"... It sets the narrative that black South Africans are going to be storming farms and driving white farmers off the land, etc. The reality is vastly different and it will affect black farmers as well as white farmers. The intent behind the law is to "expropriate" land that is not being used. Say you own a few hundred acres of land, specifically for farming. Now, say you only use about 50 acres of that land and the rest is just sitting there, for years, never used. The intent behind the government's plan is to redistribute the land that is not being used to allow said land to be used. The plan would also mean that no South African, black or white, could "own" the land. The State owns the land. If you live and work on the land, then it is yours to use (for however many generations). If you do not do anything to large swathes of the land, then it will be redistributed to others who will make use of it. "If you are a farmer and you have lost ownership of the land to the state, then the portion of the farm you are using to produce whatever you are producing should continue uninterrupted. [But] idling parts of the farm ... should be reallocated to someone else who will use it for production." He said that under the EFF's proposal, no one, black or white, will own land. All land will belong to the state. He also said that South Africans would not pay rent to the state for land, and that only corporates and foreign investors would pay rent. This is what they voted in favour for by a fairly wide margin in South Africa. Now, whether it is Constitutional remains to be seen. Nope. https://theconversation.com/land-de...gnity-and-equality-not-the-constitution-92862 https://theconversation.com/south-a...d-by-misrepresentation-and-lack-of-data-93078 https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/south-africa-needs-real-land-reform-it
Yoyr thrid refrence says this: "Rural South Africa is a powder keg. Exploited farm workers and landless people are hungry, angry and ready to take land. The conditions for a “Zimbabwe-style” land reform have been created. If amended, the constitution would just “constitutionalise” what would happen sooner or later. Land occupations and rural uprisings have happened on a small scale, right across the country, as well as in urban settings. They have focused on housing, livestock and farming." Zimbabwe-style was not too sucessful for Zimbabwe.
And did you see what followed after that? Occupied land not only concerns the white farms: it includes municipally owned and common lands. Most of these occupations are repressed and the people evicted, but some have resisted and settled. The mainstream media and academic scholarship have attached little relevance to this, but rural struggles for land and dignity are mushrooming everywhere in South Africa. I'll give you an example.. My cousin lives just outside Cape Town. She and her husband owned a largish plot of land, a few hundred acres. He had intended to farm, but then changed his mind, so the vast majority of the land remained unused, they only used about 20 or so acres for a hobby farm and he developed an amazing garden which had been a lifelong dream of his, they built their own house themselves and worked the 20 or so acres they used. Years before he fell ill (and subsequently died), just shy of retirement, and they opted to donate the unused portion of their lands to the community for them to use (they didn't need the money and the land was sitting there unused and they had had no intention of using it), since many black South Africans were homeless and living in shanty towns outside their nearest town. So they moved onto the land, had small holdings for growing vegetables and whatnot and basically used that land. Those people now risk losing that land due because of this vote to change the Constitution. It means the Government can basically take back that land and redistribute it as they see fit, since the people now using and occupying that land aren't using it for farming purposes, but for their own private use and small holdings and because the land is classified as "unused", in the sense that it is not recognised as being "used", it can be taken from them.. The Constitutional changes they voted in favour for may end up harming black South Africans just as much as white South Africans. There seems to be little to no rules in regards to what the Government will classify as "unused" land. In rural areas where blacks were literally mistreated, prevented from owning land and repressed and evicted during the Apartheid regime, the anger there is literally like a powder keg. They are angry and rightly so. But the Government's attempt to tap into that anger for political gain may end up with an issue like we saw in Zimbabwe in those areas. There are other ways to go about this, to ensure a sense of fairness and equality to the many who were repressed, as well as to farmers, community owned lands, tribal lands, commercial farmland. But it seems as though the Government is seeking to tap into anger instead of reason. This isn't a black vs white issue, as much as many are trying to portray it as such for political gain. The consequences of what they are proposing will be extreme. Rural grievances, land and agrarian questions in South Africa are indeed complex. The assumption that “all Blacks want (farm) land” and “all whites own — or are benefitting from — land” is very simplistic. It highlights “race” over “class” in this complexity. The agrarian structure and rural conflicts are not solely between white (commercial) farmers and black (landless) peasants and farm workers. It is between commercial farmers themselves, between Black indigenous people themselves and with their traditional chiefs, and between all of the above with the state (municipalities and central government). Simplifying the land and agrarian conflicts to Blacks and whites (colonialists and colonisers) is a misleading approach. Customary lands are as contentious as private farmlands. Municipalities governed by the ANC are as problematic in the way they have managed and addressed land reform as those governed by the Democratic Alliance and other opposition parties. Based on my discussions with different people, there is no homogenous voice about how people see the vote among either the landless (Blacks) or the landed (white) elite. I have heard Black small-scale farmers saying that if not followed up, “this move will be troubling”. I have seen white landowners laughing at me when I asked about land expropriation — not taking it seriously — as well as commercial farmers saying “let them try and come to my land. I will shoot them to death.” But I have also heard both Black and white people opining that land redistribution is the needed measure to solve historical injustice and inequality. South Africans urgently need a national land debate that is extended to all segments of society to continue the process of rural and agrarian democratisation. Such a debate must capture as many voices as possible to build a popular national land reform program. This needs to go beyond replacing white capitalist land owners with black capitalist land owners, while also addressing racial discrepancies. A resolution of the land question must, however, be in accordance with the needs of those who work and live off the land. This means the destruction of all existing tribal and feudal relations in the rural areas and the nationalisation of the land. A new division of the land and its management must be undertaken by committees that are democratically elected and answerable to the people. We should also note that expropriation is already in their Constitution. By which I mean unused land can already be expropriated by the State and distributed and it's been like that since 1994. So there is this sense that this is for politics or for the sake of politics. Much like Trump touted "build the wall", etc, this is another version of that in South Africa and like in the US, it is aimed at the disenfranchised, at the angry voters.
yeah yeah aaah so they are going the way of Zimbabwe then? Look yes I understand there is as what should be done, what can be done, what is practical to do, and what gets votes, what gets votes though as we saw with Zimbabwe did not work out so well.
it is sad to see a country that many around the world had invested hope into, be exploited by those in power to simply exacerbate the gap between rich & poor while leveraging racism as the excuse to undermine social economic equity. the irony is that the government can print money, so it could easily buy out land owners to distribute land while buying out and running large farms to maintain food security. it is not realistic to expect hundreds of years of war like feudalism to suddenly become social democrats whom respect and obey financial facism. the message is still get what you can while you can becvause it is one rule for the rich and powerful and another rule for th epoor and working class. that type of system takes generations to change assuming it survives any revolutions(genocide of the intellectuals etc).
While I agree it can be changed this system is instinctive, it requires constant education and will-power to overcome the desires of corruption and tribalism, this is why most revolutions end up creating governments even more corrupt and totalitarian then what they replace.
