Date: 12/02/2004
Source: Democratic Alliance
Title: Botha: Communal Land Rights Bill


ANDRIES BOTHA SPEAKING ON THE COMMUNAL LAND RIGHTS BILL

The objects of this Bill is set out very clearly in the memorandum where it seeks to formalize the African traditional system within the framework of the constitution by legally securing tenure rights of communities and people within the tenure system of their choice. The transfer of ownership from the State to resident communities is a major advance away from a century of inequity, but it is less clear how individual people, particularly women will be able to effectively communicate and exercise the choice provided for them in the Bill, especially when this choice does not coincide with that of the entrenched establishment of the community.

I do believe that this Bill, comprehensively amended as it now is, compared to the disaster presented to us at the end of last year, does - although somewhat vaguely - attempt to achieve just that, nl to free up the individual, but only time and experience will tell whether it will actually succeed in this. The background statement in this bill, spells out that the existing paternalistic system prevents social and economic advancement in those areas.

It therefore remains a question for the future to answer whether the latent paternalism that could very well remain entrenched despite this Bill, wont continue to stall social and economic advancement if it manages to prevent the flowering of individual enterprise, and that will be the acid test for this Bill.

The commercial farmland of this country is highly developed and productive because the individuals - not communities - who take the risk to till the land and graze it, enjoy security of tenure, while the communal areas are undeveloped and unproductive because neither the individual nor the community enjoys such security.

It is the individual risk-takers who developed and maintain the commercial heart of the City, not communities, and it is individual risk-takers who provide commercial services in the townships, not communities.

Let us therefore hope and trust that the department will be able to develop the capacity and skill to implement this Bill, because it is arguably the most important Bill that this parliament has deliberated on in the last 5 years, since it directly and intimately affects probably 15 million people. At present, the department has neither the capacity nor the skill, having underestimated, by their own admission, the implementation costs of this Bill by at least 800%.

Met die genade van bo en baie geluk kan die departement miskien die nodige vermo