Land reform needs to make its beneficiaries and the country better off. Little is gained in the long run if justice turns out to be purely symbolic, leaves people poorer or even aggravates grievances. So it's worrying that, as the director general of land affairs is reported to have said, at least 50% of government land-reform projects have failed to make their beneficiaries permanently better off.
In its second major report on land restitution issues in three years, the Centre for Development and Enterprise think tank argues that the country faces a worse situation than the challenges described in 2005. It says the country is looking at two likely trajectories with respect to land reform, that of "nobody wins", and "everybody loses".
A substantial jump in the number of Pentecostal Christians could have a positive impact on South Africa's social and economic development, the Centre for Development and Enterprise (CDE) said on Wednesday. "If this rate of growth is maintained, South African Pentecostals will number almost 10-million by 2011, or one-fifth of the population," the CDE said.
