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Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice, 19:3341 Copyright # Taylor & Francis Group, LLC ISSN 1040-2659 print;

1469-9982 online DOI: 10.1080/10402650601181857

Land-Reform Politics in South Africas Countryside


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The post-1994 South African government introduced a land reform in order to address racial land inequalities inherited from colonial rule and apartheid. White settlers appropriated more than 90 percent of the South African land surface. The extent of land dispossession in South Africa has no parallel in other African countries. The process began in the mid-seventeenth century, and was nalized in legal terms when the 1913 Act was promulgated. It destroyed black farming that, as Archie Mafeje and Colin Bundy argue, adapted to commodity farming where Africans became the most dynamic agricultural producers in South Africa. In some parts of the country, the colonial government and missionaries went further and established a class of African farmers.

ith the discovery of minerals, particularly gold in the 1880s, the colonial strategy shifted from promoting a class of African farmers to compelling Africans to becoming wage laborers. The legal instrument used in this regard was the Natives Land Act of 1913. This Act conned black Africans to the reserves and forbade them from buying and owning land outside the seven percent of the land that was reserved for their occupation. It also abolished the sharecropping system and labor tenancies that were alternative strategies blacks used to access land outside the reserves. These developments, according to Bundy, accounted for the fall of the peasantry in South Africa. Over time, a signicant number of rural people became fully proletarianized, but others remained in the rural areas of the reserves and became migrant workers with a tenuous link to land. As colonialists were undermining African agriculture in the reserves, they also promoted large-scale commercial farming. Unlike the reserves, where land was legally owned by the state, commercial farms were characterized by the ownership of land on a freehold title basis by white farmers. This division of South Africas countryside has led some commentators to argue that before 1994, two forms of agriculture existed in South Africa: so-called subsistence farming in the reserves and white commercial farming

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in white-claimed South Africa. Subsistence farming, however, never took root in the former reserves. It crumbled mainly due to overcrowding in these areas and the fact that men were forced to be migrant workers. At the dawn of democracy, state social grants were the dominant source of rural existence. Both residents in the reserves and farm workers were subjected to atrocious conditions. In the reserves, tensions and conicts manifested themselves between traditional authorities, which operated under the direct instructions of the apartheid regime in a system widely known as indirect rule. These authorities were given powers of administering land in these areas. They implemented policies such as the conversation measurements, known as the Betterment Scheme, which advocated the culling of stock and limiting the size of land, among others. The majority of traditional authorities also abused their powers of allocating land by imposing illegal taxes on applicants. n white-claimed farms, workers lived with their families on privately owned land. The majority would have lived on the farm for generations without having links with land outside the farm. This made them extremely vulnerable. This was largely due to massive and substantial state subsidies and, crucially, the availability of cheap black labor. Not only were workers exploited by white farmers, they were often abused and beaten. A question might arise as to how farm workers and rural residents in the former reserves reacted to the conditions they found themselves. When the colonial and apartheid regimes introduced the Betterment Scheme, there were rural revolts, the best known of which was the Mpondo revolt that Govan Mbeki, the father of the South African president, wrote about. But these revolts were put down largely because the rural struggles were isolated and not linked with other similar struggles in those urban areas. A powerful tool that traditional authorities used after suppressing the revolts of the 1960s was detention and deportation. It is, however, worth noting that by the late 1980s and early 1990s, resistance against traditional authorities re-emerged, a situation that prevailed until 1994. Farm workers were by far the most marginalized. The fact that they resided on land that was privately owned made it very difcult for them to organize and be organized. Added to this was the size and scattered nature of farms. No trade union in South Africa has been successful in organizing farm workers for precisely these reasons, and the fact that the meager wages earned by farm workers made it impossible for them to pay subscriptions that would employ organizers, as is the case with urban unions. When the ANC-led government instituted its land reform program, it had to contend with a number of constraints. The transition to democracy in South Africa in the early 1990s took place at a time when the global order was

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dominated by neo-liberal capitalism. This put the ANC in a dilemma. Although not a communist or socialist organization, the Communist Party, which was in alliance with the ANC for decades, had a signicant inuence on the organization. This is clear from some of the clauses of the Freedom Charter, the leading manifesto of the ANC and its alliance partners, around, for example, the nationalization of big industries and the redistribution of land. he rhetoric of the Freedom Charter increasingly became difcult to sustain during the political negotiation process, with the fall of the Soviet communism. Discussions within the Congress Alliance (which incorporated the ANC, SACP, and COSATUthe trade union federation) showed deep divisions over what would replace the apartheid system if the ANC were to come to power. The international climate favored the pro-capitalist forces within the ANC. For example, when the ANC launched its election manifesto on the eve of the rst democratic elections in 1994, there was a reversal of the Freedom Charters call for the nationalization of land. Although the manifesto had redistributive elements, it equally committed the ANC to a market-led land reform. Two years later, an ANC-led government embraced conservative neo-liberal economic policies. In the same year, the Property Clause that protected property rights originally acquired through colonialism and land dispossession was entrenched in the nal constitution. With regard to land reform and its implementation, government commit itself to a willing-seller willing-buyer policy framework. This was despite the fact that this principle had, by the mid-1990s, proved to be a failure in neighboring Zimbabwe. The justication for the shift is often couched along similar lines as elsewhere where these turnabouts have been made: there is no alternative (TINA) to global capitalism. Some analysts have commented, though, that this marked a victory for the more conservative, capitalist-inclined forces within the ANC, according to Hein Marais. South Africas market-led approach to land reform is, however, nuanced. First, there is a sense that the state is, in terms of the South African Constitution, expected to take active steps to ensure that citizens who are in need of land should gain access to it. Second, the protection of private property and the entrenchment of the willing-seller willing-buyer condition in policy must be balanced with the Constitutional provision that gives the state the power to expropriate land with compensation. In keeping with the spirit of the Constitution, legislation has been promulgated to address tenure problems affecting farm workers and dwellers on commercial farms on the one hand, and residents in the rural areas of the former Bantustans. There are doubts, however, about how successful these laws are in dealing with problems and conicts in rural areas. With regard to the former Bantustans, recent legislation effectively give unprecedented

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powers to apartheid created Tribal Authorities, now referred to as Traditional Councils, that are dominated by chiefs and their appointees. Under these laws, these Traditional Councils are given administration powers over land, and may even acquire ownership of the land. This state of affairs is most likely to lead to renewed conicts between traditional authorities and rural residents on the one hand, and tensions between traditional authorities and post-1994 democratically elected structures. It is, however, worth noting that traditional authorities are increasingly nding it difcult to impose their despotic form of rule, probably partly because they fear embarrassment if exposed. he same cannot be said of farm workers and dwellers. Despite the new democracy and legislation that is supposed to protect their land rights, they remain the most vulnerable and marginalized sector. In this regard, two illuminating studies are worth reading: a study conducted by the Human Rights Watch and published in 2001, and another by the Social Survey Africa and Nkuzi Development Association released in 2005. Both studies show that despite the laws that were supposed to provide farm workers and dwellers with secure tenure rights, the position of workers has not improved. If anything, conditions have become worse for a signicant portion of farm workers. For example, farm owners evict workers even in situations where there is no alternative land that they have been offered. According to the Human Rights Watch study, evictions of farm dwellers are often accompanied by violence perpetrated by white farm owners and their managers. Examples of ill treatment and serious abuses against farm workers and dwellers range from casual blows with sts to serious physical violence, including murder. The study also reported cases of rape against farm workers by white farmers and other farm residents. The position of farm dwellers is made worse by the difculty they have in accessing the criminal justice system, even in the new democracy. Farm owners often prevent them from obtaining legal representation to enforce their rights. In most cases, farm dwellers are afraid to report their bosses for fear of reprisals. All of this encourages farmers and their managers to commit violence with impunity. The reports also show that there have been cases of attacks against white farmers; evidence seems to suggest that the majority are of a criminal nature, although there is a possibility that a few might be revenge attacks on the part of evicted farm dwellers. A question that arises is how those living in the countryside and land activists representing them have responded to the aforementioned abuses. Since the suppression of rural revolts in the early 1960s, the organized voice from below in the land sector was through a group of land-based NGOs that established a network referred to as the National Land

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Committee (NLC) in the 1980s. These organizations adopted a confrontational stance toward the apartheid regime and openly identied with rural communities, particularly those who were evicted out of farms. They abandoned this approach when the ANC took control of government. Despite the fact that the ANC had adopted a market-led land reform, there seems to have been a sense among many in these organizations that the ANC government was somewhat committed to redressing historical injustices and that this would somehow be done within the limits of neo-liberal capitalism. Endorsing the protection of existing property rights, the unilateral decision by the ANC leadership to adopt the conservative set of macro-economic policies under GEAR, as well as the entrenchment of the market-based willing-buyer willing-seller principle as the basis for land reform, clearly did not discourage land activists in the NLC and its afliates from supporting the ANC-led government. As a result, the NLC resolved to support the ANC-led government in its efforts to formulate and implement the land reform program. Some members resigned from their organizations and joined the Department of Land Affairs (DLA). Those remaining in the organizations took it upon themselves to support the DLA. n addition, NGOs were under pressure from their donors who often pushed the NGOs to collaborate with government. Some of these funding agencies began to channel their funding through government agencies and expected NGOs to do commissioned work for government. A combination of these factors partly contributed to the weakening of NGOs and, more importantly, to an almost total neglect of rural mobilization, on both farms and the former bantustans. This was particularly the case in the rst few years of South Africas democracy. The end of the 1990s and the beginning of the twenty-rst century, however, marked a major turning point in the relationship between the state and civil society. On its part, the NLC and its afliates found themselves in an increasingly difcult position; they were drawn into implementing the limited land reform program while they were also confronted with growing pressures from below. Ongoing abuses on white farms described earlier and the escalating anger of black tenants over these abuses added to the pressure. Although not as prominent as in urban areas, there was also growing dissatisfaction and irritation among rural residents and their NGO supporters with government policies and their lack of impact. The unimpressive track record of the state put pressure on the NLC and its afliates. Inequality in land, the limitations of the land reform program, and conditions on white-claimed farms created conditions for mobilizing around the issue of landlessness. In this regard, the formation of the LPM

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was the most signicant resistance to the resurgent land sector in South Africa at the start of the twenty-rst century. The Landless Peoples Movement (LPM) was established in July 2001. Events in neighboring Zimbabwe in 2000 had an impact on the LPM. At the LPM inauguration in Johannesburg, President Mugabe of Zimbabwe received warm praises for his gallant actions . . . to return stolen land to the people of Africa. This was despite the fact that organizations such as COSATU, the giant South African Trade Union Federation, were critical of Mugabes undemocratic methods of implementing fast track led reform. Apart from developments in Zimbabwe, the formation of the LPM was preceded by land occupation on a farm in Bredell, outside Johannesburg, in early July 2001. Committing itself to mass mobilization around land, the LPM, at the time of its launch, called on government to urgently hold a land summit. The NLC played a critical role in the establishment of the LPM. Some would argue that the contacts that the LPM established with international organizations, such as the Brazilian MST and La Via Campesina, were largely forged by the NLC on behalf of LPM. here were two other major events that helped promote the LPM: the United Nations World Conference on Racism and the World Summit on Sustainable Development. In the run up to the United Nations World Conference on Racism, held in Durban in August 2001, the LPM threw its lot with a number of established organizations. These organizations embarked on a Landlessness Racism campaign to highlight the plight of the landless in South Africa and elsewhere. They came together under the banner of the Durban Social Forum. A year later, at the World Summit on Sustainable Development held in Johannesburg, the LPM was one of the prominent organizations behind the Week of the Landless. This time these organizations came under the umbrella of the Social Movement Indaba (SMI). Toward the end of the Summit, the organizations led a huge march to the venue of the Summit, demonstrating against the negative effects of neo-liberalism and landlessness in South Africa. Apart from these two major events, the LPM in Gauteng also joined forces with movements protesting water, electricity cut-offs, and rent evictions. There is little doubt that the formation of the LPM marked a major shift in the form of land organization and agrarian movement in South Africa, and the methods used in the demand for land in the post-1994 scenario. Additionally, this was the rst time since the 1950s and early 1960s that a movement having the potential of a mass base, led by those directly affected was emerging. Rural resistance from the 1980s was led by urbanbased NGOs with left-wing white activists, lawyers, and researchers playing prominent roles. The LPM, at least in theory, was a social

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movement with membership drawn from the grassroots of landless rural people themselves. In this regard, the LPM followed the tradition of the powerful land and agrarian movements in Latin America and Asia. The land and agrarian movement in this period was further strengthened by the entry into the land struggles and debates of the Trust for Community Outreach and Education (TCOE), a network, like the NLC, with a number of afliates below. The TCOE was established by community-based organizations from various regions of South Africa. TCOEs roots are in the Black Consciousness movement after the death of Steve Biko, and in Liberation Theology. At a time when the NLC and LPM were garnering most of the publicity and attention, TCOE and its afliates were involved in lower prole although deep rural organization. Their initial programs were in response to the education crisis following the students protests and boycotts against gutter education in the 1970s and early 1980s. n the transition to democracy, TCOE resolved to move away from the welfarist approach that characterized the 1980s to a more developmental way of working with communities. The TCOE adopted an approach, developed in Bangladesh, called Peoples Participatory Planning (PPP), emphasizing the need to involve poor communities in all aspects of their development, including planning. TCOE has, over the years, built locally based Community Development Committees (CDCs) in its areas of operation. There was a strong focus on the poorest of the poor, building capacity and local leadership with a stress on community ownership of development initiatives. Since 2000, the focus of TCOE has been on issues of land, local government, and basic needs. To mark its twentieth anniversary, TCOE organized a Peoples Tribunal on Landlessness in Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape, in December 2003. At the same time that the TCOE was gaining momentum in its land struggles, there were, by 2003, signs that the NLC and LPM were in disarray. Part of the explanation for this decline were tensions within the NLC and its afliates on the critical issue of how civil society organizations should relate with the state, on the one hand, and social movements on the other. The formation of the LPM deepened these tensions. Prominent activists in the NLC were critical in the establishment of the LPM. Yet, there was no unanimity within the NLC on the involvement of the organization in the struggles of the LPM. Some afliates of the NLC were against the involvement of the NLC in the struggles of the LPM, which grew increasingly confrontational. These afliates argued that support of the LPM would harm relations with the state. Some commentators strongly suggest that the formation of the LPM was premature. Tensions within the NLC reached a peak in the period following the World Summit on Sustainable Development. The organization never

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recovered from these tensions and ended up disbanding as a network, with afliates pursuing their own independent existence. In the midst of all this, yet another actor emerged on the land scene: the South African Communist Party (SACP). In 2004, the SACP launched its Red October campaign with a focus on the land question. In a bid to win among rural people, the SACP established an ambiguous relationship with the LPM. Both organizations supported the need for a land summit. Land Summit (organized by the DLA) was held in July 2005. Shortly before the summit, ALARM (Alliance of Land and Agrarian Reform Movements) appeared, a new consortium of movements, including TCOE, LPM, and some afliates of the former NLC, pressing for land reform. ALARMs stated mission is for a people-centered rural transformation rooted in a rapid and fundamental transfer of land to the poor and the promotion of security for those living and working on the land. Far-reaching resolutions were taken at the Summit. The principle of willing buyer/willing seller came under major attack from several different quartersand, for the rst time, ANC government ofcials appeared to be backing away from it. In his State of the Nation address to Parliament in February 2006, President Mbeki referred to the Summit resolution that the willing-seller willing-buyer condition should be revisited. It is still not clear how things will develop after the land summit. Land-based organizations in South Africa remain very weak and unorganized. The demise of the NLC and the reported divisions within the LPM are some of the examples. Other Indications point to serious discussions and conicts within ALARM. The key issue around these tensions seems to be how these movements should relate to the democratic state. Indeed, this is a challenge that has confronted most organizations in post-colonial/independence Africa. It is an issue that has yet to be resolved. We have seen how in the case of South Africa, organizations such as the NLC have moved backwards and forwards between collaborating with the state (the period roughly between 1994 1999) and adopting a more confrontational approach at times (during the Mbeki Presidency). These are, of course, broad generalizations as some organizations continued their collaborative role with the state, whereas others favored a much more confrontational approach where the mobilization of the landless themselves would be a key strategy. Another issue the formation of the LPM raised is the relationship between NGOs and grassroots social movements. Here, some of the key questions and issues revolve around how to build an autonomous peoplecentered organization that can contest powerful forces that support global capital; who should build this organization; what is the relationship of the poor to those who support them; who should determine the agenda, and so on.

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here does this leave us regarding the South African land reform program and the extent that it has contributed to the resolution of conict and violence in the South African countryside? It seems fair to conclude from the earlier discussion that despite the good intentions of the constitution and the land reform program, very little has changed in the lives of rural people. In the former Bantustans, rural residents will continue to be ruled by unaccountable traditional authorities on the administration of land. But it is on white-claimed farms where conditions of farm workers have not improved. The two studies cited in this paper paint a gloomy picture of the conditions of farm workers and dwellers, and the abuse that is handed to them by white farmers and their managers. These are enormous challenges that ask critical questions about the meaning of democracy in South Africas countryside. RECOMMENDED READINGS

Bundy, Colin. 1988. The Rise and Fall of the South African Peasantry. Cape Town: David Phillip and London: James Currey. Human Rights Watch. 2001. Unequal Protection: The State Response to Violent Crime on South African Farms. New York: Human Rights Watch. Mafeje, Archie. 1988. The Agrarian Question and Food Production in Southern Africa, in Kwesi K. Prah (ed.), Food Security Issues in Southern Africa. Selected Proceedings of the Conference on Food Security Issues in Southern Africa. Maseru January 12 14, 1987. Southern Africa Studies Series No. 4. Institute of Southern African Studies. National University of Lesotho. Marais, Hein. 1998. South Africa, Limits to Change: The Political Economy of Transformation. London: Zed Books Ltd. Ntsebeza, Lungisile. 2006. Democracy Compromised: Chiefs and the Politics of the Land in South Africa. Leiden: Brill. Weqeriff, Marc, Russell, Bev, and Grunding, Irma. National Evictions Survey. 2005. Social Surveys Africa and Nkuzi Development Association. www.nkuzi.ory.za and www.socialsurveys.co.za

Lungisile Ntsebeza is Associate Professor and Head of the Land and Governance Research Group (LGRG), Department of Sociology, University of Cape Town in South Africa. E-mail: ntsebeza@ humanities.uct.ac.za

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