Johannesburg - The great-great grandchildren of Swazi Chief Mdluli Matsafeni will soon be celebrating a R63 million land deal: HL Hall & Sons, the fruit farmer, has sold 6 000ha of prime farm land to the Mdluli clan in what has been hailed as Mpumalanga's biggest land reform deal.
Celebrations are planned for July and the clan hopes a government minister, or even the president, will attend the ceremony. But land rights activists have questioned the restitution deal, whether it is in the clan's best interests, and the clan's mandate.
They say the case, which narrowly escaped court, may have ended up fairer for the government and the clan, if it had been heard by a judge.
The Hall family, which has been farming in the Nelspruit area for 110 years, leased a parcel of land from the Paul Kruger government in 1890. The lease had an option to buy, so the family duly bought the land. The Mdlulis have been working as farm labourers for the Halls ever since.
The clan, which registered a land claim against portions of the Hall's property in 1996, fought for seven years to prove that the farm was their ancestral land. The Mdlulis originally claimed 14 000ha, but they compromised on 6 000ha, believing it was better to settle now than wait, perhaps for another seven years of negotiations to be completed.
In the early part of the last century apartheid laws forced the clan off its land but the restitution deal will ensure part of the land is returned to the Mdlulis. A further 5 000 people, who live on the land and have employment ties to HL Hall & Sons, also qualify for joint ownership of the farmland.
The sold land comprises orchards of avocado and pecan, plantations of eucalyptus, some sugar and a few hectares of litchi. Most of the crops are for export, with buyers including the British supermarket chains Marks and Spencers, Tesco and Sainsbury.
Working arrangements for Halls to rent the sold land from the Mdlulis until the clan builds up working capital and management expertise are still being hammered out. The company will also help to transfer its specialist and technical skills to the new owners free of charge.
Terry Mdluli, one of Chief Mdluli Matsafeni's great-great grandsons and the clan's representative, was a very happy man this week. Years of difficult negotiations were finally over.
He said: "It has been a long and at times challenging journey, but we are happy with the way HL Hall & Sons conducted the negotiations, and look forward to this spirit of co-operation continuing ... as neighbours."
Rob Snaddon, Halls' group managing director, who has not yet decided what to do with the R63 million, said: "We are delighted with this outcome. The majority of these beneficiaries have played a major role in the success of Halls over many years, and this outcome recognises their contribution - we believe it's a win-win deal for all ... and a positive step for the South African land reform process that is essential if we are to redress the inequalities of the past and have a stable political future in this country."
Halls, which has transferred nearly half of its agricultural land under the deal, will still have a viable farming business and is committed to commercial farming in South Africa.
However, despite the euphoria at Halls and among the clan, Chris Williams, the director of the Rural Action Committee of the Mpumalanga Province, a land rights non-governmental organisation, is sceptical.
He and the National Land Committee believe the huge R63 million settlement, which will be paid for by the government, will set a precedent the country will never be able to keep up in future land deals. There are 5 000 land claims in Mpumalanga alone waiting to be heard. The average cost of a rural claim nationally is R250 000.
The government spent between 0.4 and 0.5 percent of the national budget - about R700 million and as much as President Thabo Mbeki spent on his new jet, said Williams, who said the government was more responsive to the powerful than to the poor.
He claimed recent land deals in Mpumalanga had been "shocking" because vulnerable community people had been "bulldozed" into decisions that had not been in their best interests. He criticised the "unprofessionalism" of the Land Commission, which, he said, had neither the resources nor the experienced staff to do its job properly.
Williams wanted to know whether the land deal was truly democratic, whether Terry Mdluli was elected as the clan's representative, whether the claimants were kept informed of the negotiations, and whether the deal was in the interests of all the claimants.
Crop farming was a risky business, said Williams, and many equity deals had failed because the community did not have the right farming skills. Had the clan made the right decision to take over the farm or would it have been financially better off if it had invested the money or put the farm on the stock exchange?
"The deal has been called a 'hefty empowerment deal' but this is really about Rob Snaddon getting empowered and enriched," he said. - Linda Blackburne