CONSTITUTIONAL COMMENTARY AND EVENTS

What is ‘expropriation without compensation’ (EWC), where does it come from – and what are its implications? 

 To start with, EWC makes no sense. 

• Property rights are an indispensable requirement for all successful economies and for all genuine democracies.
• Despite the ANC’s qualifications of EWC, any dilution of property rights would inevitably have a negative impact on agricultural stability, food security, investment and economic growth.
• EWC is unnecessary.  Section 25 of the Constitution already makes adequate provision for land reform.  The failure of 90% of the government’s land reform initiatives is, according to the recent Report of the High Level Panel, due to the incapacity of government departments and the corruption of state officials. What reason is there to suppose that land redistribution arising from EWC would fare any better?
• EWC would cause a financial crisis for banks and the Land Bank, which are owed R170 billion by the agricultural sector.
• Expropriation is not necessary.  Millions of hectares of government-owned land are available for redistribution and 20 000 farms are up for sale. 
• The average age of commercial farmers is over 60.  Thousands of farmers are leaving the land because of farm murders, recurrent droughts and uncertainty caused by land reform.  Some of our best young farmers are emigrating to countries where their skills are eagerly sought.  The ANC’s real challenge may in future be to keep farmers – of whatever race – with proven food-producing abilities on the land.  
• There are other promising approaches to land reform. Organisedagriculture has repeatedly – but without any effective response – made practical proposals for the development of a prosperous black agricultural sector – and land reform schemes in the Western Cape have met with considerable success. 
• The ANC’s approach to land reform would actually undermine black property rights.  It would not result in greater black land ownership – but in most cases state custodianship. EWC would also undermine the property rights of the 7.5 million black households that own their homes.  The value of these homes (R1.5 trillion plus) is at least five times the total value of all the agricultural land in South Africa. 
  

The National Forum for Dialogue on Land Reform, held at the at the end of March in Johannesburg, was the first of many public dialogues on the land question, more specifically whether section 25 of the Constitution should be amended to enable expropriation without compensation (EWC). The Dialogue was organised – at the request of the (ANC members of the) Constitutional Review Committee – by the Gordon Institute for Business Science (GIBS), Roelf Meyer’s In Transformation Initiative and the Nelson Mandela University. Most organisations and individuals were invited at very short notice: in the case of the FW de Klerk Foundation, the invite came less than a week before the Dialogue took place. The agenda boasted a notable slate of speakers on the most topical issue confronting South Africa. Despite initial concerns about who was invited and who not, the Foundation  –  whose theme for 2017/18 is Land and Property – took the opportunity attend the two-day meeting. Ivor Jenkins, one of the organisers, confirmed that the event was organised in a very short space of time, and that some organisations had erroneously not been invited in time, but in the end those who really wanted to attend, could do so.