Lack of political will and corruption are behind slow pace of change
PRESIDENT Cyril Ramaphosa stated, once more, at the ANC 107th birthday celebrations, that the party was committed to amending the Constitution to allow for land expropriation without compensation.
This is part of the ANC’s broken promises tour, where collective amnesia is universal and exploiting people’s desperation commonplace.
Land reform is crucial in order to redress the history of violent land dispossession. The ANC has failed to implement the Constitution which allows for progressive land reform. It has now chosen to use the promise of expropriation without compensation as a panacea.
What does not paying compensation have to do with the chronic understaffing of the restitution commission that has resulted in about 19 000 unfinalised claims submitted before the 1998 deadline? Nothing. How does expropriation stop the ANC from giving farms and properties to connected cronies? Nothing. How does not paying for land protect communal residents’ insecure tenure rights? Again, nothing.
The simple fact is the ANC has no plan to address the real problems plaguing the land reform programme in South Africa. It is more important than ever to acknowledge that the Constitution is not the barrier to land reform but rather, corruption, constrained budgets and a lack of political will are the real reasons land reform has been so slow.
South Africans can send a clear message at the ballot box this year, to stop the ANC and EFF from capturing a two-thirds majority and vote for a party that can deliver land reform.
The DA believes that South Africa belongs to all who live in it, and we will fight for the protection and expansion of individual property rights.