Ann Eveleth
Free State farmworker Samuel Moabi (55) has once again fallen victim to old-style rural labour relations.
Moabi’s latest employer, farmer “Labbies” Labuschagne, fired him for speaking to the Mail & Guardian, Moabi said this week.
The M&G interviewed Moabi in early November after a Welkom magistrate fined his former employer – Bothaville farmer Wessel Wessels – a paltry R3 000 for beating and chaining Moabi to a workshed table in late 1996. Moabi, who still bears the scars of that ordeal, lost his job with Wessels and lived at the mercy of a local church until he found employment with Labuschagne in September 1997.
Moabi and his family were living on the Labuschagne farm when the M&G located him there last month. Labuschagne flew into a rage when he arrived to find Moabi being interviewed, berated Moabi and chased the reporters off his farm with the words: “You must ask me if you want to speak to my service.”
Moabi and his family are once again at the mercy of local churches, eking out an existence in an informal shackland on the edge of Bothaville’s Kgotsong township, according to Dutch Reformed Church minister, the Reverend Nicodemus Setsedi, who was this week trying to arrange assistance for the family.
“As soon as [M&G reporters] left the farm, the farmer had some argument with [Moabi] and then chased him and his family off the property,” said Setsedi.
The South African Council of Churches has also promised to assist Moabi, and the Free State Rural Committee hopes to find a legal solution to his latest troubles.
Committee representative Ruarie O’Conchuir said the eviction appeared to run foul of the new Extension of Security of Tenure Act, which came into effect two weeks ago, as well as the Basic Conditions of Employment Act. “You can’t just evict someone without a court order,” he said.
Labuschagne could not be traced for comment this week.