Land Claims Commissioner Tozi Gwanya has threatened ”halstarrige [obstinate] boere” in Limpopo with expropriation several times. The threat highlights the deep mistrust between farmers, the land authorities and even claimants in the province, where a startling 85% of farmland is under claim.
In Steel Valley, residents say cats are born without heads, a piglet had sexual organs growing out of its anus, and a cow born hermaphrodite had to be put down. Vegetables grow in strange shapes and even the rats are ill. These alleged monstrosities, have prompted diehard residents of Vanderbijlpark, launch fresh legal action against South Africa’s steel giant, Mittal Steel.
Modderklip’s 12 000 illegal squatters are to be shifted from their present location, and the government will not be buying the invaded land from the farmer who owns it. This decision follows a recent landmark Constitutional Court judgement, which ordered the authorities either to buy the occupied land from the farmer or to find an alternative site to house residents of the ”Gabon” shack settlement.
Despite the government’s R500 million investment in nuclear technology, South Africa has no final policy to deal with nuclear waste. No deep-level depository, the final resting place for waste, has yet been identified by the government. All waste is currently stored on-site at Pelindaba and Koeberg.
Support for claims of unacceptably high radiation levels at an old nuclear calibration site near Pelindaba has come from an unexpected quarter: the government’s Land Claims Commission. Green activist lobby Earthlife Africa triggered a public debate last week when it claimed there were high levels of radiation at the site, a kilometre from Pelindaba.
About 250 land claimants in Gauteng and North West have failed to collect more than R3-million awarded to them in terms of South Africa’s Land Restitution Act. Payment has been approved by the Gauteng and North West Land Claims Commission, but the claimants disappeared during the six weeks between the finalisation of their claims and the signing of the final settlement papers.
Land claimants who missed the deadline are paying self-professed ”land lobbyists” fees to persuade the government to reopen the process and facilitate late claims. Victor Mahlangu, spokesperson for the Gauteng Land Claims Commission, said individuals are giving late claimants false hope and making money out of them.
When and where were you born? In 1951 in Worcester, the Western Cape. When and where did you matriculate? From Worcester Boys High in 1969. What were you favourite subjects? Art and maths. Any fond memories you have of your school days? No, my fond memories have nothing to do with school. How did your […]
Research released last week has found that there has been almost no redistribution of white-owned land in Limpopo, one of South Africa’s richest agricultural provinces. More than three-quarters of the province’s agricultural land remains in white hands. It paints a bleak picture of the pace of land reform in a province that stands at the centre of South Africa’s land reform programme.
Monash, the largest university in Australia, is aiming to have a campus on every continent by 2020. Already it has six campuses in Australia and one in Malaysia. The South African version is based in Roodepoort, west of Johannesburg, and boasts brand-new facilities. ‘Innovation, internationalisation and engagement: these are the three key reasons behind the […]