Reply: how a government panel on land reform in South Africa is stuck in old ways

Abstract

As a member of the Presidential Advisory Panel on Land Reform and Agriculture, I am happy to respond to Prof Gran’s commentary on the work and conclusions of the panel. Before I reply in detail it is important to provide some context and background to my comments. Land reform is one of the unavoidable policy discussions that have dominated South Africa’s agricultural policy landscape over the past two decades and promises to remain part of the discussions over the foreseeable future. More so, as data continue to show that the progress made thus far on land reform falls short of the government’s 30% target at the dawn of democracy. Vink and Kirsten (2019), estimate that 20% of the targeted land has already been transferred away from white landowners to the State and black owners, and some through private and State-supported transactions including land restitution. These transfers have been through restitution, redistribution, private transactions and State procurement. Moreover, South Africa’s land reform programme continues to be marred by the poor and slow implementation, corruption and many failed farms. The failure to transfer land the State has acquired to the beneficiaries over the last 26 years can also be ascribed to the State’s unwillingness to engage the private sector, agribusiness, and existing landowners to be part of the solution. To contribute towards the better delivery of the land reform programme and address the failures mentioned above, President Cyril Ramaphosa assembled a panel of experts – The Presidential Advisory Panel on Land Reform and Agriculture (Panel), to undertake the task. The Panel’s report initially drew criticism from various farmer interest groups as it did not denounce the emerging policy proposal that South Africa should consider Expropriation of Land Without Compensation. While such critique is understandable, it shows that some critics lacked a clear understanding of the central mandate on this proposal. The Panel was tasked to outline “under what conditions should Expropriation of Land Without Compensation be applied”. It was not to ask if the Panel agreed with the proposal or not. Some scholars, such as Prof Gran, have already engaged with the details of the report and offered views on it. Prof Gran is not new in the South African land reform discussion. Some of his essential work includes the 2002 paper which explored the subject of power and trust in land politics in South Africa, arguing then that trust in government concerning land policies is waning, despite progress in the redistribution of land (Gran 2002). This time around, Gran remains sceptical about the focus of South Africa’s land reform policy proposals. Commenting on the Panel’s work, Gran points out some supposed gaps in the final report from a political economy perspective (Presidential Advisory Panel on Land Reform and Agriculture 2019). Such supposed gaps include a lack of focus on improving local democracy and the absence of insight into striking a balance between state and market power and between liberalism and social democracy in South Africa. According to Gran the Panel offered limited insight or plan