Issued by Daniela Ellerbeck on behalf of the FW de Klerk Foundation on 30/09/2025

The MK Party’s MP, Mzwanele Manyi, has tabled a bill in Parliament seeking to nationalise all land and make the state its sole custodian. “The bill will also change the Constitution to allow all types of property, not just land, to be expropriated without compensation and to extend the date for restitution claims to 6 April 1652, effectively reopening land claims to the date of Jan van Riebeeck’s arrival,” explains Daniela Ellerbeck, an attorney and the Foundation’s Constitutional Rights Programmes Manager.

“This bill is anti-South Africa’s ‘democratic society based on human dignity, equality and freedom’: It removes the power from the people and subjects them to the whims of an unscrupulous authoritarian government,” states Christo van der Rheede, the Foundation’s Executive Director.

“If passed, this bill would strip every South African of their constitutional right to own land. State custodianship would reduce citizens to perpetual tenants of the state, dependent on government favour and voiceless in decisions shaping their lives. Everyone would lose the power the Constitution gives them, leaving them vulnerable to state overreach and political abuse,” agrees Ellerbeck.

“It has the potential to destroy South Africa’s hard-won constitutional democracy and discourage any economic investment if it becomes law,” concludes van der Rheede. “This is why the FW de Klerk Foundation made a formal legal submission to Honourable Manyi when he first notified the public of his intention to table this bill and urged the public to do the same.”

The bill has been referred to the National Assembly’s (Parliament’s first house) Justice Committee. The FW de Klerk Foundation will continue monitoring the bill’s progress and alert the public to opportunities to engage.