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FARMLAND SETTLEMENT ISSUE

26/07/2018 02:33:00 By vusi Kunene

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THE hype around elections is at fever pitch and it’s good that people are allowed to elect their own government as it is their human right. People are encouraged, though, to vote with their brains and not their hearts.

They should not vote for someone because he or she is a relative or neighbour or because he or she is from your umphakatsi. I also plead with those elected to do well by the people who elected them. I think they should also discuss the elephant in the room; ‘is the Tinkhundla System of Governance giving people of the country maximum gains’? If yes, what should be done to stop the grumbling and complaining that we hear from others? Can those grumbling and complaining be engaged and be heard what their complaint is about and how do they see it being solved.

I want to also plead with the people to be elected that they should not fail us like their predecessors. They must follow the Constitution of this country and they must work on the land question in this kingdom. The heartless evictions of people from land that they have been calling home for a very long time is not a good thing. The Farm Dwellers Act has failed a number of people and the tribunals that are formed by such a statute are also not doing justice to the people who are being evicted. The farm owners have never been asked where they were when people settled on their farms. They have never been asked why they allowed these people to stay for so long on the farms. I was disturbed to hear that there are still more evictions coming. This plea also applies to the courts that are called to determine these issues.

The disturbance that comes with evictions is beyond comprehension. There can never be development if people have no security of tenure where they are settled. People will never build good structures because while building one has to be cautious and think about the possibility of being evicted from the land in future.

People cannot develop themselves where they are not sure if they will remain there permanently. In my opinion it is the duty of Parliament to address this issue and parliamentarians can pass a law to that effect. I am not saying they should pass a law that will be detrimental to farm owners as we also need them for the development of the country but they must not be negligent in their ownership. The truth of the matter is that they are also not helping in developing the country because the land where the people build their homes is land that is idle.

If the land was in use the people would not have settled there in the first place. People leave their land unused for more than 10 years and you wonder how much that land would have produced if it was utilised.
The drafters of the Constitution of the kingdom were wise enough to realise that the land issue would cause problems in future and they included Section 59 (6). They realised that the land issue was necessary for the economic development of the country and under the economic development of the country they included that the State shall endeavour to settle the land issue expeditiously. They went on to mention that solving the land issue would bring unity to people of the country. And the truth is that there will never be peace in the country if people are not guaranteed their right to the land where they are settled. That is why in the Bill of Rights it is mentioned that people cannot be compulsorily deprived of their property.

The argument will be that these people do not own the land and I agree but the law also has a doctrine known as estoppel. When people are allowed to stay on land for years with no one questioning them then that creates the impression that they are well settled on the land. This is more so because the people are usually given the land by someone else. Some farm owners buy the farms which already have people settled there and they do not bother to discuss that with the seller of the farm. The next thing they evict people who were allowed by the farm seller to settle there. But the Farm Dwellers Tribunals and the courts do not enquire about that, instead they jump to allow the evictions of people which tend to be emotional and an economic drain to the people. This is why I am pleading with those who will be going to Parliament to address this issue. We cannot say that more than 18 years is expeditious enough to deal with such a sensitive issue.