The volatile and exploitable nature of South Africa’s land narrative was on show earlier today as both the EFF and DA issued statements that drew a line in the sand about people getting evicted from land and farmers getting brutally murdered.
On the one hand was Mandisa Mashego, EFF provincial chairperson, who told the Human Rights Commission inquiry in Braamfontein looking into last week’s Red Ants demolition of 80 shacks in Alexandra that it was inhumane to treat people this way.
Mashego told the inquiry that “the EFF primarily exists to advance the struggle for land justice which translates into economic justice”.
She also reiterated that “land in South Africa must be expropriated without compensation”.
The emotively explosive nature of the debate around land was also brought to bear in the Western Cape where that province’s premier, Alan Winde, addressed journalists after the necessity of a rural safety plan was once more highlighted.
This comes after the cold-blooded killing of Stefan Smit on his farm, Louisenhoff.
Winde remarked that it was important that the province’s R18-billion agricultural industry be protected. The said the provincial government had been asked by farmers to forge ahead with the safety plan, because the national government wasn’t.
