The government will soon be releasing land owned by state-owned enterprises such as Transnet and Eskom for land reform, public works & infrastructure minister Patricia de Lille said on Friday.
“We are engaging with public enterprises minister [Pravin] Gordhan to look at well located land owned by state-owned entities ... Transnet, Eskom, Prasa, Sapo [SA Post Office] have a lot of land. They should be brought into the land reform programme. We cannot just have state-owned entities holding on to land which is not being used,” De Lille told MPs during a meeting of parliament’s ad hoc committee on amending section 25 of the constitution — the property clause — to make expropriation without compensation an explicit provision.
De Lille said deputy president David Mabuza will soon convene a meeting with all state-owned entities to ascertain what land they own.
In 2020, the government announced that it will lease 700,000ha of farmland acquired by the state to black farmers, as it moved to tackle the pressing land question that has polarised SA in recent years.
The land reform programme has largely been tardy and chaotic with a 2019/2020 report of the auditor-general showing that the eviction of farmers from their profitable farming enterprises by “rogue officials” of the department of agriculture, rural development & land reform had resulted in claims of more than R2bn being instituted against the state.
The state has a huge property portfolio including more than 1.9-million hectares of land under the custodianship of the department of public works. Critics of the drive to amend section 25 of the constitution to make expropriation of land without compensation explicit often say the government should focus on redistributing land it owns, some of which is unaccounted for or underused.
Pointing to land audits conducted by the state — most recently one in 2017 which showed that about 14% of land was owned by the state and more than 79% was owned by individuals (most of them white), companies and trusts — De Lille said: “We know exactly what land is owned by the state ... yes, land reform has been slow, but there is now a commitment from government to speed up land reform.
“It is absolutely not true to say we do not know how much land is owned by the state. Some of the land is owned by national government, some by the provinces and some by municipalities. We need to look at all that land instead of that owned by national government, and that will speed up land reform.”
On the Expropriation Bill, which is before parliament, De Lille said it brings certainty to South Africans and investors because it “clearly outlines how expropriation can be done and on what basis”.
“The courts will be the final arbitrator because section 34 of the constitution states that ‘everyone has the right to have any dispute that can be resolved by the application of law in a fair public hearing before the court’,” she said.
There are two separate but related processes in motion regarding expropriation without compensation. The ad hoc committee on section 25 is focused on the wording of the property clause in the constitution with the aim of making clear that which is implicit regarding expropriation of land without compensation, as a legitimate option to tackle skewed land ownership patterns dating back to the apartheid and colonial eras. An amendment to the constitution such as this will require the support of at least two-thirds of members of the National Assembly for it to pass.
Meanwhile, the portfolio committee on public works has also been holding public hearings on the Expropriation Bill, which seeks to provide clarity on how expropriation in broad terms can be done and on what basis. The bill outlines circumstances when it may be just and equitable for zero compensation. It does not, however, prescribe nil compensation and provides that the amount of compensation will be determined by the courts. Ordinary bills require a simple majority (50% plus 1) to pass. Once promulgated, it will replace the Expropriation Act which dates back more than four decades.
The ANC has previously proposed shifting the arbitration powers from the courts to the executive in terms of compensation to be paid. Mathole Motshekga, who leads the ad hoc committee, said previously that if the courts determined compensation “it will take another 25 or 50 years to sort out land reform”.
De Lille said it will ultimately be up to MPs to decide on whether amending section 25 should be done before finalising the Expropriation Bill.
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