The Namibian government has announced its intention to speed up land reform, but within the confines of the law.

Prime Minister Theo-Ben Gurirab, in an address to the nation Wednesday evening on television and radio, said the reform process was very slow and the demand for land high.

"Over the years, government has come to realise that the willing-seller-willing-buyer approach is cumbersome and as a result, it would not be able to keep up with the high public demand for agricultural land," the prime minister said.

That process was "too slow because of arbitrarily inflated land prices and the unavailability of productive land".

More than 240 000 landless people are currently awaiting resettlement, Gurirab said, noting that Namibia's constitution provided for land expropriation in the public interest and against payment of just compensation.

To speed up the pace of land redistribution, parliament passed an amendment to the existing Agricultural (Commercial) Land Reform Act last year to allow for expropriation.

"The expropriation of land is being introduced to accelerate the land reform process in the country. However, the introduction does not signal the doing away with the principle of willing-buyer-willing-seller; the two interventions will actually run concurrently", Gurirab said.

Since the land reform and expropriation would be done in accordance with the constitution and "the relevant legislation", Gurirab called on landowners, landless citizens and all Namibians to exercise patience and "not to engage in unlawful actions during the implementation of the land reform process.

"It is our desire to complete this exercise in a legal, stable, transparent and peaceful manner," Gurirab concluded.

The Agricultural (Commercial) Land Reform Act of 1995 provides that those Namibian citizens who do not possess any or adequate agricultural land and who have been "socially, economically and educationally disadvantaged" in the past, can apply for land.

Since independence in 1990, the Namibian government has acquired 118 farms (statistics of 2003), totalling 709 568 ha for $105-million, resettling 37 100 individuals in 6 180 families. – Sapa-AFP.