Expropriation Bill: decades in the making, what lies ahead for South Africa? – Daily Maverick

A code has been sent to …. Please check your email and enter your one time pin below:
  Open in Gmail

Forgot Password?

Years. In fact, the whole issue of land used to be a much hotter topic in the South African political discourse than it is currently. It probably reached its highest temperatures around 2017, when the ANC adopted the principle of land expropriation without compensation at its Nasrec conference. 
In 2018, Parliament held often extremely fraught public consultations on whether the Constitution was impeding land restitution on the grounds of Clause 25, which protects property rights.
At that point, the more conservative view was that the Constitution should be left untouched and the Expropriation Bill should be passed instead. 
After further national consultations, the National Assembly adopted the Expropriation Bill in September 2022 and sent it on to the National Council of Provinces for various small amendments. The bill was ultimately passed by Parliament on 27 March 2024 and has been awaiting the president’s signature ever since.
There are certain pieces of legislation in the works which are sure to inflame tensions within the Government of National Unity (GNU). The obvious examples in recent months were the National Health Insurance (NHI) Act and the Basic Education Laws Amendment Act (Bela), but the Expropriation Bill falls into the same category.
In all these cases, it’s unclear whether Ramaphosa gave other party leaders in the GNU a heads-up about what his pen was about to do. On these occasions, rival politicians have given the impression of being blindsided.
In response to the Expropriation Bill, the Freedom Front Plus released a statement in which it said that Ramaphosa had not consulted with the GNU before signing the law.
A rural woman digs for clay to produce bricks near Coffee Bay, in South Africa’s Eastern Cape. (Photo: EPA / Kevin Sutherland)
Shacks erected at Cape Town’s Foreshore on 4 December 2018 in Cape Town, South Africa. (Photo: Gallo Images / Brenton Geach)
Illegal structures built on vacant land at a farm next to Kayamandi on 6 August 2018 in Stellenbosch, South Africa. (Photo: Gallo Images / Brenton Geach)
The DA, meanwhile, published a statement on Thursday of just three sentences on the matter, devoted mainly to announcing that the party was in “discussions with our legal team”. The sense appeared to be that the party had been wrongfooted to some degree.
It followed up on Friday with a statement terming the signing of the bill “a matter of utmost seriousness”, with the party vowing to “fight this dangerous legislation by every possible means”.
President Ramaphosa is in Davos, Switzerland, this week for the World Economic Forum. He is leading an extensive delegation to the forum which includes a number of GNU ministers: Agriculture Minister John Steenhuisen (DA), Communications and Digital Technologies Minister Solly Malatsi (DA), and Environment Minister Dion George (DA). Things might just have become a wee bit frostier over there.
The most controversial word in the bill is “nil”: it provides for “certain instances where expropriation with nil compensation may be appropriate in the public interest”, to quote its opening lines. 
This aspect was foregrounded by AgriSA in a statement which described the bill as a “risk to private property rights” and therefore also “a risk to agricultural sustainability and food security”.
The Freedom Front Plus says it is particularly unhappy about the fact that the law applies to “movable and immoveable, such as intellectual, property ownership” — which would suggest that it is theoretically possible for the government to use the law to “expropriate” your motor vehicle or work.
This is an apparent reference to the fact that the bill’s preamble quotes Section 25 of the Constitution as clarifying that “property is not limited to land”. But Section 25 of the Constitution has stated this, together with providing for the expropriation of property, for three decades.
Action SA says its beef with the bill is that although it is ostensibly premised on the “willing buyer, willing seller” principle, the law “ultimately allows the government to unilaterally set the price if an agreement cannot be reached”.


When announcing the signing, the Presidency stressed that negotiations between the government and the seller must take place on “reasonable terms”.
It stated: “In terms of this law, an expropriating authority may not expropriate property arbitrarily or for a purpose other than a public purpose or in the public interest”.
The Presidency also stressed: “An expropriating authority must also attempt to reach an agreement on the acquisition of the property before resorting to expropriation — except in circumstances where the right to use property temporarily is taken on an urgent basis in terms of a provision in the legislation”.
These assurances may not convince everyone, especially with the example of Zimbabwe offering a nearby precedent for a botched land reform project in which land expropriation was the key instrument.
Legal experts and agricultural economists seem more relaxed about the bill than the politicians.
Indeed, the Dutch Ministry of Agriculture described the fears around the bill as “bloated”, and wrote: “While land is a sensitive topic in South Africa and the passing of this bill has been divisive, it is clear that there is no immediate risk to land ownership security. This is an important outcome for the agriculture sector where land is a key asset.”
Annelize Crosby, head of legal intelligence at Agbiz, previously wrote for Daily Maverick: “Every government in the world can resort to expropriation as a means to acquire property for certain public purposes.” 
She also pointed out that “powers to expropriate for various purposes already exist in more than 200 other pieces of (South African) legislation”.
If this bill was scrapped, Crosby argued, it would do nothing to prevent the state from expropriating land, since that right was already enshrined in the Constitution. What the bill does do, in theory, is provide certain checks and balances.
Among these, writes Crosby: “It provides for extensive consultation with affected parties, including financial institutions that hold bonds over the affected property, and persons who have rights to the land but are not landowners. It also provides for a series of offers and counter-offers in an attempt to promote agreement between the owner, bond holder and authority on the amount of compensation. Should it be impossible to reach agreement, then compensation must be decided upon by a court of law.”
Nobody is quite sure what the circumstances in which the government would offer “nil” compensation for land would look like, which is one of the points of anxiety. But what is certain is that the law will be abundantly tested in court. 
This is really the million-rand question, because the reality is that a whole lot more would have to change beyond the signing of this piece of legislation.
Research over the years has repeatedly suggested that the major beneficiaries of the government’s land reform programme to date have been politically connected elites. DM
All Comments 22
Vote DA, dont be fooled !!
Clever CR -blindsiding the rest of the GNU !!
Ha ha exactly like he did with the extra ministerial posts. He is too smart for the handwringers.
“Clever-CR”? More likely “not to be trusted CR”
You have been fooled. The DA rolled over and played dead with BELA, and meekly surrendered on this one too.
Your vote in May for the DA has been hijacked and given to the ANC.
There is no red line that the DA will not allow the ANC to cross. You’ve been played. Now for the NHI.
This idea of ‘rolling over’ is repeated time and again. Falsely. The DA can’t stop the process of a Bill that is under way. For new (bad) Bills, GNUparties can limit these. For existing ones they can use the Courts (this one), or develop implementation safeguards (BELA).
Just the Zulu king controls land bigger than Kruger National Park via his trust. So an unelected feudal lord determines where South African citizens can live or farm.
Let’s unlock all traditional leader land and give those subjects title deeds!
What lies ahead for South Africa is more disinvestment. The ANC is on the march to destabilise the country and create chaos so that they can loot.
I agree more disinvestment
You think investors are Calvinists ne?
I recall someone like David Bullard or Gus Silber wrote that there are three indicators for when our democracy is failing into a fascist community state: parliament stops functioning, you cannot settle a contract dispute in court anymore ie. Courts failing, and private property rights threatened.
Elon has just tweeted about this. Let’s hope that the he can help restore civilized standards in South Africa, as he has helped do in the United States and is now doing elsewhere. So many countries, so little time.
Preferably Elon will keep his Fascist standards in America and leave the rest of the world alone.
Hear Hear!
Heaven help us if Elon Musk is our hope.
Dutch ministry of agriculture “no immediate risk” – says it all. No immediate risks mean there are risks. Read between the lines
This Bill may be being paraded as a means to address land reform but will in turn become a feeding frenzy for the politically connected and their ilk. The disenfranchised and destitute will not benefit one iota.
This is just a new way for the corrupt ANC government can loot & in rich themselves! Just like the NHI is going to be, just like there new BEE rules that want 3% profit from corporations!! This is all to fund there rich and corrupt lifestyles! The corrupt ANC government is destroying this country!
There is legislation that governs whether a company can retrench an employee. Ie. there is legislation that allows a company to terminate a written agreement with someone. That legislation has many parts to it that require lots of bargaining and negotiations and consultations. People still get fired
A working economy is what we need.
Jobs => money => land, a house, or whatever one wants.
Zim 2 in the making . Farworkers will suffer the most. They will lose their jobs , extending the line of the unemployed ., ministers will grab land for themselves, many will receive land no bigger a few square meters, enough to build a shack with no water and sanitation and NO INCOME .
What will prevent Julius and friends from laying claim to Johan Rupert’s assets ?. This bill signing looks more like an immitation of Donald Trump’s actions . And what about AGOA, Cyril ?
Daily Maverick © All rights reserved

source

About The Author

admin

See author's posts