This shows initial intention was to deal with the land issue on South Africa, In light of the passing of our Mama Nomzamo Madikizela Winnie Mandela, we shifted the focus in dedication to her name, person & legacy. However, Mama Nomzamo fought for the land, so this was no diversion but an enhancement to the show.

Just under a year after a similar vote was soundly defeated, the government in Azania (South Africa) has passed a motion to return the land back to the indigenous inhabitants without compensation. The motion was brought to parliament by the Economic Freedom Fighters Party (EFF), led by Julius Malema where it passed 241 votes to 88. (1) The motion was supported by African National Congress (ANC), Inkatha Freedom Party, and the National Freedom Party. (2)

 

Commenting on the result, Malema sought to effect a distinct break with the country’s recent history: “The time for reconciliation is over. Now is the time for justice.” (3) For his part, new president Cyril Ramaphosa while stressing the importance of preserving food production and security, has vowed to speed up the transfer of land and “resolve the issue of racial disparities in property ownership “once and for all.” (4)

 

What is at stake, according to date from the Alternative Information and Development Centre, is the over 72 percent of the total of 37 million hectares of farm and agricultural holdings owned by Anglo-Boers. (5) Not only has the rate of change on land reform from successive ANC governments has been painfully slow, evidence suggests that much of what has been carried out so far has actually favoured white businesses. (6)

 

It is expected that an ad hoc parliamentary committee will be established to initiate a consultation process with a view to making the necessary amendments to the constitution. The president has counselled calm throughout the process and asserted: “There is no need for any one of us to panic and start beating war drums.” (7)

 

It is not counsel that white nationalists, within the country and globally, have been inclined to accept. They have been advancing a narrative of mass murder against white farmers, galvanising overseas allies like UKIP in the UK, Info Wars in the USA and Rebel Media in Canada. However, evidence to support these claims have been found considerably wanting. (8) In fact, it would be fair to say that in some quarters the global white hyperbole echoed that which accompanied the early days of the land reclamation process in neighbouring Zimbabwe, which itself was followed by a relentless propaganda and economic assault. (9)

 

Nevertheless, the Australian Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton waded in, eschewing all diplomatic conventions, offering white farmers refuge in the “civilised” country of Australia. (10) Given its historic parallels with apartheid, it’s no surprise that Australia displays such an affinity with the so-called plight of the Anglo-Boers. (11) Ultimately, Australia’s stance is nothing more than their manifest commitment to global white nationalism.

 

So while global Europe steadfastly advocates for its own, the ANC government for the past two and a half decades has yet to substantively begin to address the “original sin,” as the president recently referred to it, of the dispossession of Afrikan land. (12) Some have argued that the ANC’s own Freedom Charter, drafted in 1955 precludes the right to address this issue, thereby causing a break in the liberation movement. The Pan Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC), Dr. Mangaliso Robert Sobukwe and his colleagues such as Peter Raboroko, Selby Themba Ngendane, Potlako Leballo, A.B. Ngcobo, Zephania Mothopeng, Jafta Masemola and Nyati Pokela later warned:

“It has completely abandoned the objectives of freedom. It has joined the ranks of reactionaries. It is no longer within the ranks of the liberation movement. These ‘leaders’ consider our country and its wealth to belong to all who live in it, dispossessor and the dispossessed, the alien robbers and the indigenous victims. They regard as equals the foreign master and the indigenous slave, the exploiter and the African exploited, the foreign oppressor and the indigenous oppressed…” (13)

 

So generations before the EFF it was the PAC that raised the cry of ZWE LETHU iAFRIKA meaning “The Land Is Ours”. (14) But since the watershed elections of 1994, the PAC has struggled electorally. It won five seats that year but currently has a solitary member of parliament. However, in forming a partnership with the civic organisation the Forum for Service Delivery (F4SD) has set a target of 25 seats (the number of seats EFF has presently) the national assembly for the 2019 elections. (15)

 

Irrespective of what the ANC governments does, the rural areas are already considered a powder keg with land occupations and rural uprisings have happened on a small scale, right across the country. According to social activist and academic Boaventura Monjane, “rural struggles for land and dignity are mushrooming everywhere in South Africa.” Monjane’s field work also reveals that white farmers are not necessarily taking the land reform seriously, believing they can avert it by force of arms. (16)

 

The ANC’s track record on land reform has been unimpressive but the weight of the people may at last be pushing them to act. An influential EFF and a potentially resurgent PAC may strengthen the legislative resolve. But they are up against a propaganda war waged by pan-Europe based on the mythical empty land narrative that Europeans found when they arrived on the continent as a basis of their claim to the land. (17)

 

Historian Dr Motsoko Pheko, offers a corrective to the fallacious Anglo-Boer account:

 

“The long settlement of colonialists in South Africa by force of arms has not passed any right to them to own this African land at the expense of its rightful owners. It does not matter how long Europeans have been settlers here. Azania remains the land of African people by right.” (18)

 

(1) Rangi Hirini (28/02/18) South Africa’s parliament votes to give land back to black people. https://www.sbs.com.au/nitv/nitv-news/article/2018/02/28/south-africas-parliament-votes-give-land-back-black-people

(2) Ra’eesa Pather (27/02/18) First step to land expropriation without compensation. https://mg.co.za/article/2018-02-27-historic-vote-land-expropriation-without-compensation-passed

(3) Hirini. Op cit.

(4) Samuel Osborne (01/03/18) South Africa votes through motion to seize land from white farmers without compensation. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/south-africa-white-farms-land-seizure-anc-race-relations-a8234461.html

(5) Boaventura Monjane (09/03/18) Poor black South Africans are ready for real land reform, but who will benefit? https://www.pambazuka.org/land-environment/poor-black-south-africans-are-ready-real-land-reform-who-will-benefit

(6) Ashleigh Furlong (02/03/17) Land reform favours businesses, not the poor – study. http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/land-reform-favours-businesses-not-the-poor-study-20170302

(7) Osborne. Op cit.

(8) BBC (03/11/17) Are protesters right on South Africa farm murder rate?: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-41807642

(9) Ron Wilkins (04/09/02) Report from Zimbabwe: Western Lies And The Struggle To Return Indigenous Land To Its Rightful Owners! http://www.blaqfair.com/blaqfair/zimbabwe/rpt_Zbw.htm. Also see: Olatunji Heru (2008) Land Or Democracy? The Whirlwind, Edition 6. p. 20-21

(10) BBC (14/03/18) Australia considers visas for white South African farmers. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-43403408

(11) John Pilger (05/11/13) In the lucky country of Australia apartheid is alive and kicking. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/05/australia-apartheid-alive-aboriginal-history

(12) Ra’eesa Pather (14/03/18) Ramaphosa dodges explaining land reform plan. https://mg.co.za/article/2018-03-14-ramaphosa-dodges-explaining-land-reform-planmg.co.za/article/2018-02-27-historic-vote-land-expropriation-without-compensation-passed

(13) Motsoko Pheko (06/07/17) Why Africans have no land in South Africa. https://www.pambazuka.org/human-security/why-africans-have-no-land-south-africa

(14) Obi Egbuna Jnr Simunye (09/03/18) SA begins to appreciate Zimbabwe’s foresight. https://www.herald.co.zw/sa-begins-to-appreciate-zimbabwes-foresight/

(15) African News Agency (10/12/17) PAC aiming for 25 seats in Parliament after 2019: F4SD. https://www.enca.com/south-africa/the-pac-should-get-at-least-25-seats-in-parliament-in-2019-f4sd

(16) Monjane. Op cit.

(17) Pheko. Op cit.

(18) Ibid.

 

we ask the question:

 

Is it “land at last” in Azania?

1) Are the EFF the new power brokers in Azania?

2) If the land reform process proceeds will Azania receive the Zimbabwe treatment?

3) Are white farmers really under attack?

4) Do whites have any rights to the land in Azania?

5) Why has the PAC struggled electorally?

6) Can it win 25 seats in next years elections?

 

Our very special guest:

 

Bro. Sbusiso Xaba: is the Deputy President of Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) of Azania a position he has held 2014. He was previously president of Pan Africanist Youth Congress of Azania (PAYCO) from 2005-2007. His other student affiliations include the student chapter of the Black Management Forum, Pan Africanist Student Organisation and Pan Africanist Student Movement (PASMA) of Azania. Bro. Sibusiso has been deeply involved in the struggle for broad transformation of pedagogy and epistemology in institutions of learning in order for them to be accessible to the African working class, improve quality of content, endorse socialist values and espouse African oriented curriculum.