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Land to domnate African politics
Political Editor Munyaradzi Huni
"NO LAND, NO VOTE", protesters from the Landless People’s Movement of South Africa screamed as that country’s President Thabo Mbeki launched the African National Congress’ election campaign in KwaZulu Natal last week.
In Namibia, a high-ranking representative of the Herero tribe that was slaughtered by the German colonial troops about a century ago, Mburumba Kernina, fired the warning shots last week:
"Don’t forget, our young generation does not have the angelic patience of the elders . . . If there is no agreement, they will probably take matters into their own hands. What happened in Zimbabwe can easily repeat itself here."
This was in reference to the land demonstrations that engulfed Zimbabwe between 1998 and 2002.
It’s now a matter of which country between South Africa and Namibia will explode first due to the land question and once that happens, and it will, then other countries in the region and eventually the continent will follow suit.
South Africa
South Africa is due to hold its presidential and general elections in April this year although that country’s leadership has not yet confirmed this while Namibia is set to hold its presidential elections next year.
The statements by the protesters in South Africa and Kernina in Namibia sound unrelated, but to those who can read between the lines, these statements are telling one big story that is set to decide the politics of the region, if not the whole continent.
A closer look at the pattern that is slowly developing due to the events in South Africa and Namibia easily tells that after Zimbabwe, the land issue is set to determine the politics in South Africa and later the whole continent.
With the way the land issue is boiling in South Africa, it looks as if it would be suicidal for President Mbeki and the ANC to ignore or play down the land issue during the campaig ns.
In Zimbabwe, the land issue played a big role in deciding the winner during the 2002 presidential elections that were won by President Mugabe. The MDC’s Morgan Tsvangirai misfired when he failed to come clean on the land issue and he was resoundingly beaten by over 400 000 votes.
And just as the land issue decided the politics of Zimbabwe, the same issue is set to decide the politics in the South African elections and President Mbeki would ignore this thorny issue at his own peril.
At the moment, just as it was in Zimbabwe about 10 years ago, the South African leadership will pursue the supposedly lawful means to redistribute land to the landless and restless majority but what the ruling party has achieved in that regard since coming into power in 1994 is not impressive at all.
A recent independent survey shows that nine out of 10 acres of commercial farmland is still in the hands of 50 000 white farmers.
In 1994, the ANC government promised that it would use the treasury and the law to transfer about 30 percent of white-owned farmland to blacks in five years, but today 10 years after that promise only 2,3 percent has been transferred.
Black South Africans are not amused at all. They are getting angry and they are openly asking what this talk about an "independent South Africa is all about". They don’t understand what they fought for.
That great civil rights leader, Malcolm X, on April 8 1964 gave a speech on "The Black Revolution" at a meeting in New York where he concluded saying:
"Revolutions are fought to get control of land, to remove the absentee landlorld and gain control of the land and the institutions that flow from that land . . . The past type of mentality, that was developed in this colonial system among our people, today is being overcome. And as the young ones come up, they know what they want. And as they listen to your beautiful preaching about democracy and all those o ther flowery words, they know what they are supposed to have.
"So you have a people today who not only know what they want, but also know what they are supposed to have. And they themselves are creating another generation that is coming up that not only will know what it wants and know what it should have, but also will be ready and willing to do whatever is necessary so that what they should have materialises immediately."
This was way back in 1964, but it sounds like Malcom X was speaking a few days ago. Black South Africans are screaming to the ANC that they "know what they want" and if they are not listened to they will "do whatever is necessary to see that what they should have materialises immediately". Zimbabwe did the same in 1998 after years of agonising with the willing-seller willing-buyer land redistribution system since 1980.
Led by the Landless People’s Movement, the land-hungry blacks in South Africa are accusing the ANC government of dilly-dallying with the land issue to avoid upsetting the whites who still control that country’s economy.
In November last year, South African police in their "struggle against evictions" had to be called in to arrest residents of Illitha Park after they forcibly settled themselves on a nearby farm. In July last year, the same residents of Illitha Park together with some from Mandela Park were arrested after they demonstrated against land disparities in the area. Residents in these two parks are, as one journalist put it, "overwhelmingly poor and unemployed".
As the temperature continues rising over the land issue, even the courts in South Africa are beginning to see the unfairness in the land distribution patterns.
In February last year, the Pretoria High Court made a ruling that the State was responsible for providing 40 000 landless people with alternative land and housing. The court noted in its judgment that the state had the power to expropri ate land from its owner, Abraham Duvenhage, and allocate it to the "Benoni squatters".
Despite the clear signals from even the courts, the South African government seems unperturbed and is still looking at the land issue as a minor issue that will solve itself with time. Solve itself, yes, it will, but the ANC should not blame anyone when black South Africans claim that which is theirs by "any means necessary".
Already, the Landless People’s Movement is winning massive support across South Africa in its "No land, no vote" campaign against "10 years of ballot box democracy that have failed to return the land that was stolen from us during colonialism and apartheid".
Said the movement’s national council in a recent Press statement: "Almost 10 years have now passed since the end of apartheid, and more than 26 million people are still poor and landless, because the government does not care about breaking its promises to us.
"We continue to lose our lan d through farm evictions by racist white farmers who are supported by the government that we put in power, and through urban forced removals by councillors who are still implementing the apartheid plans to force poor black landless people far beyond the edges of our cities to die in wastelands with no housing, no water, no electricity, no schools, no clinics, no food and no jobs!"
The movement is demanding that the SA government agree to a "Land Summit" to see how the landless majority can get their land and mend relations with white farmers who are being accused by the movement of brutalising blacks with the blessing of the police and the justice department. The movement’s national organiser said last week: "What we want is land for the landless people and poor of South Africa. If we get that, we are going to vote."
At the moment, President Mbeki’s main fear is that addressing the land issue "the people’s way" could dent investor confidence and make him the West’s enemy Number 2 after President Mugabe, but soon he will realise that if he lets the land issue get out of hand, he could lose both the investor confidence, make himself the West’s second enemy and probably lose in the forthcoming elections. One of the upcoming writers, Mukoma wa Ngugi in his recently published book, "Conversing with Africa: Politics of Change" gives the ANC some advice:
"The international community has highlighted the question of land in Zimbabwe while all but ignoring the same question in South Africa. And in South Africa, the tragedy is playing itself out in greater magnitude. The BBC in 2001 reported that ‘Since 1991 a total of 1 044 farmers have been murdered on their farms . . .
"It is inconceivable that the ANC is sanctioning the farm attacks. But the point is that given the magnitude of the attacks, coupled with the question of land redistribution in Zimbabwe, the ANC cannot afford to avoid the land question".
Fore warned is being forearmed. President Mbeki and his ANC should know that they would be digging their own grave if they avoid the land issue as they seek re-election this year.
Namibia
In Namibia, President Sam Nujoma has come out into the open saying he will not seek re-election next year. The 74-year-old leader is well-known for his stance on redistributing land to its rightful owners, no wonder why a group of traditional leaders in that country is persuading him to stay on until the land issue is resolved.
This clearly means that whoever succeeds President Nujoma is expected by the Namibians to tackle the land issue even more vigorously. The triumph card for whoever is to rule the southwest country after President Nujoma is the land issue. It is estimated that about 4000 mostly white commercial farmers own just under half of the arable land in Namibia.
That country’s government is currently redistributing land through the principle of the willing- buyer and willing-seller meaning that no one is forced to sell land, but if they do, the state gets first refusal. But Namibians are getting angry over the snail’s pace at which they are getting their land. Since President Nujoma got into power in 1990 only 7 percent of commercial farmland has been returned to black farmers. And at the rate at which the programme is being implemented it is estimated that it would take until 2070 to get 50 percent of Namibia’s farms back to their rightful owners.
Namibians can’t take this anymore and the country’s leadership is well aware of the boiling issue.
When thousands of Namibian communal farmers marched against the ruling Swapo demanding land reform, President Nujoma extinguished the ragging flames when he appointed the communal leaders’ leader, Gabes Shihepo into his Cabinet as deputy minister of information and broadcasting. The demonstrations died instantly, but only temporarily.
In 2002, President Nujom a announced that the Government would repossess about 192 farms that were not being utilised or were owned by foreign absentee landlords.
Even the Namibian Prime Minister Theo-Ben Gurirab knows that the people in the country are getting restless and angry about the slow pace at which the land reform programme is being carried out. When he got into office in 2002, the PM quickly said he would put great pressure on white farmers to sell their land.
But then still the white commercial farmers are not forthcoming and the powderkeg that the government is sitting on is ticking too fast. There could be an explosion anytime.
So when President Nujoma leaves, his successor and Swapo have to be very clear on the land issue because this is the issue that could make or break them.
The South African and Namibian governments are trying to avoid the "Zimbabwean style" of redistributing land to the majority but they are lying to themselves if they think there is any other better way.
Malcom X would say: "Freedom is not something that someone gives you, you take it." And if the governments of South Africa and Namibia think the white commercial farmers will give up land just like that, then it may take forever for them to solve the land question.
One of the greatest political analysts, Frantz Fanon in his book "The Wretched of the Earth" says: "National liberation, national renaissance, the restoration of nationhood to the people, commonwealth: whatever may be the headings used or the new formulas introduced, decolonisation
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