KZN ANC not consulted on Ingonyama Trust issue

FORMER president Kgalema Motlanthe and his high-level panel failed to consult with the ANC and local government in KwaZuluNatal before making its recommendations that land under the Ingonyama Trust be expropriated and the trust be scrapped, according to ANC KZN co-ordinator Sihle Zikalala.

The ANC in KZN has pegged its stance that land under traditional leaders, such as the Ingonyama Trust, should be exempt from expropriation without compensation. Political analyst Professor Somadoda Fikeni said this approach was predictable as elections were around the corner.

“The ANC is worried that other parties like the IFP may upstage them in KZN because they are moving closer to the king (Goodwill Zwelithini) over this issue,” he said.

Fikeni said Ramaphosa and his ANC needed to explain to the Zulu monarch their position on land expropriation. Speaking at the ANC’s land summit in Durban yesterday, Zikalala told delegates that the provincial ANC, provincial government, the KZN legislature and the provincial house of traditional leaders were not consulted in the high-level panel’s public engagement programme.

The delegates at yesterday’s meeting were invited from the ANC’s regions and leagues, provincial farming organisations and NGOs.

“Their recommendations and findings are of their own view and not that of the ANC. The ANC respects traditional leaders,” Zikalala said, reiterating President Cyril Ramaphosa’s explanation to Zwelithini last week that land under the trust was not targeted by land expropriation.

Ingonyama Trust chairperson Judge Jerome Ngwenya said they welcomed and appreciated Ramaphosa’s approach, but the details were still going to be discussed further in a more structured meeting.

Judge Ngwenya said Ramaphosa did not have much time with the king last Friday, and although he told the trust that their land was safe from expropriation, there were still concerns, given the parliamentary bill.

“The high-level panel was not the only thing that created this unfortunate anxiety. There is still a bill in Parliament waiting to be passed,” he said.

Judge Ngwenya added that the king and the trust had still not decided who will be representing them at the public hearings next week.

The ANC held the land summit to consolidate a proposal ahead of the parliamentary hearings on land reform to be held in KZN next week, but provincial task team convener Mike Mabuyakhulu told delegates that the summit would only address how to implement the governing party’s resolutions on expropriation of land without compensation and not issues of land tenure and the future of land, which falls under institutions like the Ingonyama Trust.

He said the land under consideration was privately owned land.

“That is the land we are looking for. That 87% which is in the hands of commercial owners,” he said.