Durban - More than 4 400 new claims have been registered with the KwaZulu-Natal Land Commission since the reopening of the claims process in July.
Priority has been given to claims lodged before December 1998, except where the commission wants to address old and new claims simultaneously.
Chief land claims commissioner Nomfundo Gobodo recently issued a notice inviting potential claimants to lodge, or re-lodge, claims for 11 farms in the uThukela district (Ladysmith) and parts of Welverdiend farm in the eDumbe district (Paulpietersburg).
This was after the initial claim, made before December 1998, failed to comply with the commission’s requirements. Instead of dismissing the claim outright, Gobodo decided to give claimants an opportunity to re-lodge while giving an opportunity for submissions of new claims as well.
The uThukela district farms at stake include 14 portions of Varkens Fountein, 12 portions of Doorn Spruit, 11 portions of Kop Leegte, six portions of Hasse Fountein and parts of Bon Joy, Winterton Settlement, Chieveley, Doornkop and Hillgrove.
The initial claim was apparently made by the Emantanjeni community from the Hlubi tribe. The farms they want are mostly irrigated land used for grazing and planting crops including maize.
Attorney Bertus van der Merwe
, who represents the current landowners for the affected eDumbe and uThukela farms, said they opposed the claims. He said the matter might have already been decided upon in court had the claims process not been reopened.
“We (should) rather deal with the matter once, inclusive of the new claims and re-lodged ones,” he said.
The landowners wanted the matter finalised, saying it had been a matter of constant stress since the early 2000s.
“It remains to be seen whether the government will want to buy back all the claimed farms because we are talking about thousands of hectares. A hectare of irrigated land costs around R100 000,” said one.
David Clouston of Thukela Berry and Waldo Bossie of Doorn Spruit said they were expecting new claims on their farms as well.
“We can’t do much but wait for the court process to run its course,” said Clouston.
The Mbhele family, who form part of the Emantanjeni Community, live on a small part of Wood Groove Farm which they successfully claimed from the previous owner.
“We’ve been living here since I was a little boy and my father and brothers worked in Wood Groove and neighbouring farms. I joined them when I was old enough to herd the cattle and milk the cows,” said Boy Mbhele, who is in his seventies.
Mbhele lives with his family of 12. They share about 100m x 100m of land with his younger brother, Sifani, and his family of four.
“We’re grateful that at least our houses are on land that we legally own, but we need more land for grazing and for planting maize,” said Sifani, who is also a pensioner.
“Our cattle graze in the yard and we have to rely on a municipal water tanker. We don’t have access to the Little Tugela River,” said Mbhele.
Mike Cowling of the Association For Rural Advancement said they were concerned that some of the claims might be consolidated then lodged under a traditional leader’s name instead of that of the community.
“This is one of the concerns that opponents to the reopening of the process had. It was suspected that one of the objectives would be to undermine communal land claims and instead transfer the claimed land to traditional authorities.”
Ingonyama Trust chairman Judge Jerome Ngwenya said they were going to investigate whether some of the identified land once belonged to the Zulus.
“We can’t say that we will lodge a claim for any of that land until we have evidence that the Zulus are the rightful owners,” he said.
The trust, responsible for 2.8 million hectares in KZN, made headlines in July when King Goodwill Zwelithini announced he would partner his chiefs in lodging a blanket claim for all of the KZN land that did not already belong to the trust, and possibly parts of other provinces too.
“We have not finalised our investigation and some of the chiefs are yet to be consulted, but the research is ongoing,” said Ngwenya.
Tara Weinberg, of the Centre for Law and Society at UCT, raised concerns about the government’s failure to provide post-settlement support.
“Too often the land is transferred and the government’s interaction ends there. But when people were dispossessed of their land, they didn’t just lose their land – they also lost their ways of life,” she said.
“For people’s livelihoods to improve there’s an urgent need for the government to support beneficiaries with training and funds.”
The Mercury