Jaspreet Kindra
The Department of Agriculture and Land Affairs took flak from within African National Congress ranks at this week’s land tenure summit, with a civic leader accusing it of promoting tribalism and an ANC parliamentarian insisting that South Africans want individual title to their land.
ANC MP Lydia Ngwenya rejected the idea, embodied in the department’s draft Communal Land Rights Bill, that state land should be transferred to ”communities”.
The Bill, which recognises African traditional communities as juristic persons capable of acquiring property and includes traditional leaders in the right-holders structures, stirred controversy at the summit in Durban this week.
Ngwenya, leading the commission on the role of traditional leaders in land administration, denied that individual ownership would undermine the authority of traditional leaders.
”Just because you own your home does not mean you do not respect traditions and traditional structures; it does not mean you do not continue to participate in traditional activities. Rural dwellers who live in the former homelands cannot understand why the rules applying to them are different from those that apply to people living in former ‘white South Africa’.”
Ngwenya, a former trade unionist and land rights activist, argued that land rights of individual land users and occupiers had to be recognised and protected by law. ”This would be in line with the Freedom Charter demand that the land shall belong to those who work it.”
Dan Mphahlele, deputy president of the South African National Civics Organisation in the Northern Province, who says he is a chief’s son, accused the department of encouraging ”tribalis”.
At stake is the authority of traditional leaders who administer communal land comprising 13% of land in South Africa and accommodating 13-million people, or 32% of the population.
Land affairs officials tried to make a case for the ”African way of life”, supporting a continued role for traditional leaders. Chiefs such as ANC MP Phathekile Holomisa, also the president of the Congress of Traditional Leaders of South Africa, and Inkatha Freedom Party MPL Hulumeni Gumede backed the department’s stance, asserting that traditional leaders could be democratic.
Also sounding a note of approval was King Goodwill Zwelithini, chairperson of the Ingonyama Trust, which administers communal land in KwaZulu-Natal. The trust administers 30% of land in the province.
Holomisa argued that the legal title to communal land should be made in the name of the relevant traditional authority. ”Not to do so would amount to the further erosion of the role of traditional leaders in the life of our people, and would serve to cut the ties between the land, the people and their ancestors who bequeathed the land to us … We are told that as traditional leaders we are the collective link with the ancestors.”
Land affairs director Sipho Sibanda, who is responsible for the Bill, lashed out at those critical of the role of traditional leaders as ”progressive liberals”.
The draft Bill, he argued, grants a role in land administration to existing local institution including traditional leaders. ”This is a significant contribution towards the resolution of the issue of the role of traditional leaders and institutions in communal land administration.
”The role to be played by traditional leaders and institutions in land administration and natural resources management is guaranteed in the constitution and other relevant laws. This legislative achievement will undoubtedly pave the way for the resolution of the role, powers and functions of traditional leaders and institutions in local government.”
Reports this week indicated that a revised Bill will be tabled next year. However, officials indicated that clarity would only be achieved after the Department of Local Government has drafted a White Paper on the role of traditional leaders.