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At today’s sitting of the Portfolio Committee on Rural Development and Land Reform, the ANC used its majority to block the DA’s request that Minister of Rural Development and Land Reform, Gugile Nkwinti, come to Parliament in order to debate his department’s controversial new land policy proposal.
 
Myself and Tsepo Mhlongo, the DA Shadow Deputy Minister of Rural Development and Land Reform, requested a presentation from Minister Nkwinti or a departmental representative so as to kickstart debate in the committee next week.
 
Despite the far reaching consequence and the seriousness of the Minister’s policy, the ANC rejected the amendment, inter alia, stating that the committee had another five years to deal with such policy matters.

The DA will now have no choice but to table, and push for, a motion for a full debate at a sitting of the National Assembly at the next available opportunity.
 
Given South Africa’s history, land reform remains an urgent concern for South Africans, and in this instance, particularly farmers and farm workers alike.

The ANC’s reluctance to prioritise the land security concerns South Africans have in committee, illustrates a disingenuous commitment to real land reform.
 
In their current form, these policy proposals will lead us on a path of forced expropriation, greater government control of farming development, insecurity, job losses and rural decline.  

It also runs contrary to the National Development Plan by removing the willing buyer, willing seller principle, and placing development funds in the hands of a government that has thus far failed to run any state owned enterprise efficiently.
 

 
The DA in the Western Cape is prepared to move beyond its own highly successful equity share schemes model to pilot the NDPs proposal for land reform. We are committed to participating with all role-players to make it succeed, and to make people who work the land, the owners of land.
 

 
With a 92% failure rate on land reform projects, government cannot afford another failed policy.
 

 
The DA will continue to fight the formation of a constructive space for policy debate and the creation of a viable land reform policy.