Minister of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development, Thoko Didiza reiterated yesterday that despite Mangosuthu Buthelezi’s announcement on Friday of Inkosi Thanduyise Mzimela’s withdrawal as the new chairperson of the Ingonyama Trust Board, the department still regarded Mzimela as the chairman of the trust.
Didiza was speaking at the portfolio committee on agriculture, land reform, and rural development briefing held at the National Assembly.
“Just to clarify the issue, we have noted the media statement that was made by Inkosi Buthelezi with regard to the consultation which he held with Isilo (King Misuzulu kaZwelithini). However, there hasn’t been any formal communication to us as indicates anything different than the letter he had written to us. So from where we stand, the chairperson of the Ingonyama Trust board as the nominee of the king is Mzimela, who is here with us today.”
This follows Buthelezi announcing the withdrawal and the department stating that only the king can make such an announcement, not Buthelezi as he had no status in the Ingonyama Trust.
The Ingonyama Trust is in charge of 2.8 million hectares of tribal land across KwaZulu-Natal and it nets millions in rental income.
The land is also rich in minerals like coal and iron-ore.
The Ingonyama Trust board is responsible for the administration of the affairs of the Ingonyama Trust. The Ingonyama Trust was established in 1994 by the KwaZulu government to hold all the land that was owned or belonged to the KwaZulu government.
The trust describes its mandate as to hold all this land for the “benefit, material welfare, and social well-being of the members of the tribes and communities” living on the land. The sole trustee to land under Ingonyama Trust is His Majesty the King Misuzulu kaZwelithini.
The trust has been surrounded by controversy and had been under fire over its poor corporate governance and its failure to present plans of how it will use funds for development programmes for women, youth and people with disabilities living under the traditional authorities.
Yesterday, the trust presented its brief annual performance plan prepared by the board that was replaced in 2022.
Ingonyama Trust CEO Vela Mngwengwe said: “We explained this in the last financial that part of the challenges of the board in the past years has been that there have been governance challenges that have been raised by the auditor-general over a period of time.
“When we started in 2021, one of the things that we wanted to do was to demonstrate our commitment to addressing those governance challenges as a consequence of which we then brought in an indicator for external audit management action plans being implemented,” Mngwengwe said.
He said this was the type of indicator that would ordinarily be seen in an operational plan of an organisation.
“We elevated this to the strategic level because we wanted to clearly indicate our intention to address those challenges. So therefore, it was a new indicator in the last financial year, and the current financial year, and we also brought it into the audit management action plans for the same,” he said.
He said the trust achieved unqualified audits in 2021 and 2022, and intended to do so as it proceeded.
The trust chief financial officer Siyamdumisa Vilakazi presented the medium-term expenditure for the 2023/24 financial year.
He said the Ingonyama Trust board received 14.6% less in the 2023/24 financial year, an R5.5 million reduction from the 2023 financial year.
“The total amount of transfers in 2023/24 amounted to R23.800m.
“Then transfers increased by R1m from R23.800m to R24.824m. With another R1m increase in 2025/26,” Vilakazi said.
He said the grant received covers in terms of expenditure compensation of employees and goods and services at percentages of 60 and 40%, respectively.
“On this latest average budget of the Ingonyama Trust, as reflected the revenue for the 2023/24 financial year is expected to be around R55m, which comprises mainly of rental income and other forms of passive income like interest from investments,” he said.
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