The ANC in KwaZulu-Natal has told President Jacob Zuma it wants the government to speedily expropriate land and do away with the willing buyer, willing seller principle.
Delivering his keynote address to thousands of ANC supporters, who packed a sports field in KwaDukuza, ANC KwaZulu-Natal chairperson Sihle Zikalala talked directly to Zuma. He said it was intolerable for the land issue to be delayed further.
Zikalala said the ANC should discuss the matter during its upcoming policy conference.
“Towards the national policy conference we are going to embark on a broad community consultation process on the principle of land expropriation.
“We want to ensure expropriation of land. At least 70% of land must be expropriated into the ownership of the state, and be leased to the people who are going to use it,” said Zikalala.
Zuma had made an unexpected appearance to the event whose main speaker was supposed to be ANC treasurer Zweli Mkhize.
The ANC had been complaining about the willing buyer, willing seller principle as being the hindrance in transferring the land to the poor.
Zikalala said the office of the valuer-general should have a final decision in determining the compensation to the farmers.
“This thing of the people who dispossessed us of our land determining the compensation price should come to an end. It must be the office of the valuer general that has the final decision,” said Zikalala.
Zikalala said when the government takes over the land, it should give 50% of it to farm labourers.
However, he said beneficiaries who failed to use the land for productively would have to be replaced by those who would use it accordingly.
“The policy of use the land or lose it must be adopted and applied immediately. The ownership of land by capitalists who stole it must come to an end,” he said.
Mkhize said the ANC would apply the law in expropriating the land. “We will take the land from the current owners, and talk about compensation later. We will have to look at this to deal with the problem of people having no land, which is an asset.”
Mkhize said those who were calling for Zuma’s resignation should wait because he was “busy working”, including dealing with the expropriation of land.
“He had to get business owners to contribute R1.4 billion to help small businesses,” he said.
Zuma said it was not a blessing for the minority of white people to own “vast plots of land” while the majority of indigenous people have none.
“If we don’t get the land back our generations and generations would suffer extreme poverty. One of the ways to ensure that black people have economic power is to give them back their land. We are going use the law to get back the land instead of using violence the way they (current owners) did when they took it from us.”