Elite agenda to capture land reform talk?
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THE land question in South Africa remains unresolved. Every few years it pops up timed with one or other political agenda.
If you are attuned to the suspicious manoeuvres common in Moscow, Washington and Pretoria, or any other capital, you could be forgiven for believing there is always a subtext.
Why table this provocation at this particular moment? The cynical side of my mind can’t help thinking that it is to draw fire away from the social grants fiasco.
More quick and easy money is to be made from that than the thorny swamp that land reform has become.
Or maybe it is designed to turn attention away from the ANC’S internal factional battles around its leadership.
Perhaps it is to quietly tie up the nuclear deal and make even more dirty money than anything that even Sassa can pass under the table.
It might appear irresponsible posing these suspicions in this way, but there are far too many unknowns in our country.
Unless we frame the questions and ask them, we could be taken for a merry ride which, like the arms deal, has left bills for our greatgrandchildren to settle.
Moments of quiet are dangerous in politics as politicians and their shady travel companions have a knack for being wide awake while everyone else is off-guard.
If I recall correctly, fishing licences and quotas were quietly and opaquely hived off while some other issue was bobbing on the headlines.
Similarly, illegal fishing trawlers captured by the navy were allowed to slip out because the government did not want to antagonise its Chinese friends.
That was a flagrant assault on our sovereignty not unlike the Gupta plane violating Waterkloof. It was allowed to go away quietly with no consequences.
The hired mafia in the propaganda business dreamt up something else to rankle an unsuspecting populace while the crooks slipped away with the country’s silver.
Even if it might be a distraction, the land question is important enough to keep on the boil. Referendums are an attractive proposition when faced with contentious issues.
It is very interesting that the proposal of testing expropriation without compensation has emerged from the ANC in Kwazulu-natal. While the rest of the country is politically dormant or dysfunctional, the ANC leadership in KZN is frequently a breath of fresh air, putting forward thoughtful ideas.
There were good grounds then for the premier last week to cite a newspaper poll that ranked KZN the top province.
The criteria for the assessment were exhaustive, but it appears this is one province that is getting a handle on fighting poverty and being connected with the people.
Contrast this with private fiefdoms like the Free State and Mpumalanga or perennial basket cases such as the Eastern Cape and Limpopo.
No one pays attention to the Western Cape, of course. It does a fantastic job of making a good life for the rich while quietly hiding its poor.
For the purposes of this argument, it is prudent to point out the KZN premier’s reference to the Muden community which is being held up as a model of land reform.
In this instance, white farmers and the local community have entered into a 50-50 voluntary land share programme. This is surely an accolade to be celebrated after 350 years of land grabs and dispossession.
It must, however, not draw attention away from the bigger issue that the majority of South Africans remain landless and poor.
Land purchased on the open market is inaccessible to the majority.
Another burning question is the vast tracts of unused or underused state land or land tied up with traditional authorities.
It is a shame KZN replicates the agrarian patterns that were common during apartheid. It is white farmers who continue to make productive use of the land while areas under traditional leadership boast little more than a few simple dwellings and sparse herds of cattle.
There is something seriously amiss here. Former president Thabo Mbeki went hammer and tongs for a programme to create large-scale black capitalist farmers, but that yielded little more that politicians and connected people grabbing some booty.
Black peasant producers have plodded on as they have done for decades.
As the debate is currently framed, there is a great risk that the land reform debate will be captured by an elite agenda, leaving the poor mired in poverty.
This is not a matter to be left to politicians alone. Civil society needs to rise to the challenge and by this I don’t mean the one man and a bank balance brigade like Black Land First.
This space in the land reform and restitution battle must be seized by those who can organise on the ground. The only legitimate voices will be those of the landless and the poor. Be wary of those who speak for them while seeking only to line their own pockets or advance a nefarious political agenda.
• Buccus is senior research associate at ASRI, research fellow at UKZN School of Social Sciences and academic director of a university study abroad programme on political transformation.