The Landless People’s Movement (LPM) lamented on Thursday what it described as a grotesque distortion of its programmes by the media, and denied having any violent or lawless intentions.
”The LPM has no paramilitary units nor camps, nor does it have any plans to form paramilitary units, nor to launch ‘revenge attacks’ or any other ‘vigilante’ action against abusive white farmers or any other landowners,” it said in a statement.
The body claimed it is being demonised for political reasons.
”The LPM is a non-violent, rights-based movement struggling for comprehensive land and agrarian reform for the country’s 26-million poor and landless people.
”The LPM believes there is a war in the South African countryside, but it is a one-sided war waged by unrepentant, abusive white farmers against poor and defenceless black farm dwellers whose only recourse is to a rural criminal injustice system dominated by the interests and alliances of white farmers.”
All its activities, the movement said, are aimed at putting pressure on the government to speed up land redistribution through legislative and policy changes.
The solution, the LPM added, is a ”comprehensive redistribution” of land from 60 000 white farmers controlling 85% of the land.
”Legal and constitutional land expropriation is a common phenomenon in all democracies and the LPM regrets the alarmist response that its use in post-colonial societies elicits from many commentators.”
Recent reports have quoted the LPM as threatening to create a people’s army for self-defence unless the government protected farmworkers from abuse by their employers.
It has called on its members not to vote in this year’s general elections, and has reportedly warned of farm invasions if the government does not make haste with land restitution. — Sapa