Recourse for evictees

THE three subsections within section 26 of the constitution of South Africa stipulate that everyone has the right to have access to adequate housing.

The second subsection proclaims that the state must take reasonable legislative and other measures, within its available resources, to achieve the progressive realisation of this right.

The third subsection states that no one may be evicted from their home, or have their home demolished, without an order of court made after considering all relevant circumstances.

This means that no legislation may permit arbitrary evictions.

These proclamations make it incumbent on the state to safeguard the rule of law in protecting its citizens.

The proactive intervention by the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform to amend the extension to the Security of Tenure Act seeks to strengthen the existing legislation to put a stop on land evictions.

The extension of Security of Tenure Act in its current form has a number of confines that make it easier for farm dwellers to be evicted by landowners. The description of the occupier of land by the act is too broadly defined and it is susceptible to wrong interpretations.

The act categorises some farm dwellers as the main or primary occupiers while others such as wives and children as secondary occupiers.

By categorising them as such opens them up to some degree of vulnerability which leads to some kind of unwarranted evictions.

This vulnerability arises especially upon the death of primary occupiers. By noticing this discrepancy, the department’s plan to amend the current act will go a long way in providing and strengthening legal recourse that protects against farm evictions. Themba Mzula Hleko Pretoria