THE Mpumalanga farmer who has become the first person in the country to have his land seized for redistribution has vowed to exhaust all legal avenues in fighting the government’s attempts to expropriate his land.
Willem Pretorius, who has been notified that he must either reach a settlement with government on the price of 1 270ha of his farm near Lydenburg, or have it expropriated on March 20, says he is prepared to fight the matter in the Constitutional Court, the highest court in the country.
Pretorius is prepared to accept R2.1m for the land on which government wants to resettle some 600 families from the Dinkwanyane tribe who were forcibly removed from there in the 1950s. But the authorities have made him a final offer of R850_000.
Pretorius claims such a deal could ruin him financially.
?The community was removed from that land nearly 20 years before I bought it. I think it is unfair that the present government wants to penalise me for what the previous government did to them.”
The Transvaal Agricultural Union (TAU) has accused the government of blatant discrimination and racism for the “monstrous way” in which it handled the matter.
Moses Mushi, spokesman for Agriculture and Land Affairs Minister Thoko Didiza, said the expropriation adhered to the letter of the law.
“We must keep in mind that this very same land was expropriate from the Dinkwanyane community for the benefit of white farmers. Only, they did not get any compensation.”
Pretorius claims he is entitled to R2,1m for his property, as this was the amount determined by an independent valuator appointed by the government in 1998.
Last year, a second valuator put the price at R1,5m. This was the amount accepted, from which was subtracted soft loans and subsidies granted to Pretorius by the previous government, to arrive at the sum of R848_485.
“You cannot use state money to develop a farm and then expect us to give you more state money to buy back that same land,” Mushi said.
Pretorius said he would not keep fighting the government should he lose his legal battle.
“It will be a terrible setback, but I will just have to start over. I cannot do anything other than farming, so I will have no choice but to start from scratch.”
A neighbouring farmer, Kallie Joubert, has agreed to sell his farm to the government for R1m.
ZA*NOW:
Farmers slam State for ?stealing? land March 14, 2001
State grabs second farm for restitution February 19, 2001
Stubborn farmer gets land grabbed February 13, 2001