Cape Town - The Department of Public Works and Infrastructure is expected to give a report to MPs on the work it has done in the past few years on land reform in the country.
This department and another were sent packing by MPs two weeks ago due to the fact that they were unprepared for their presentations.
While the Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development returned to the ad hoc committee on land expropriation last week to make its submissions, chairperson of the committee Mathole Motshekga said they were now ready for Public Works to brief MPs.
Motshekga said the committee’s main objective was to finalise the Bill on amendments to section 25 of the Constitution without delay.
He also said ANC MP Cyril Xaba would work on the revised report of the committee. If other parties had different views, they would be allowed time to make their inputs, he added.
“We will circulate it because that mandate must be owned by all of us and I think we will ask (Xaba) to circulate it so that all members of this committee can read from the same page and sing from the same hymn book. Honourable Xaba is discharging a mandate from us, he is not dictating for us. As I said he has an institutional memory because he has been working with the administration and he has been doing very well,” said Motshekga.
He also maintained that they wanted to finalise the Bill on amendments to section 25 of the Constitution soon.
The ad hoc committee has been working on the process to amend the Constitution to allow for the expropriation of land without compensation over the past few months.
But the DA and Freedom Front Plus warned the committee that if the process was not followed this matter would be taken on review.
Already some of the opposition parties are not happy that some of the written submissions have not been considered.
They complained recently that this could lead to a legal challenge.
This was the point they raised at the start of the process some time ago – that when procedures were not followed it could up the process to legal review.
But the committee has said it wanted to ensure that all processes were followed before the matter is finalised.
The committee had sought and was granted extension by Parliament to extend the deadline for its work from March until the end of May. This was after MPs could not finish their work last month due to oral submissions by various stakeholders in the sector.
Political Bureau