Expropriation without compensation was ratified by ConCourt 20 years ago – Brett Herron

29 September 2022

Note to editor: This is the speech that was delivered by GOOD Secretary-General and Member of Parliament, Brett Herron, during today’s debate in the National Assembly on the Expropriation Bill.

Madam Speaker…

Colonial and apartheid land grabs, never reversed, are a major contributing factor to the state of acute inequality in our land today.

Historically excluded from land ownership, the vast majority of citizens remain excluded today because they can’t afford the price of entering the property market.

Their exclusion from the property market means they lack tangible assets to leverage cash from the financial sector, which leads to their economic exclusion.

It’s a cruel and vicious cycle.

Expropriating land in appropriate circumstances is one of the tools at government’s disposal to accelerate land reform. This is not new. For the past 47 years the State has been expropriating land under the 1975 Expropriation Act. That is the Act which this Bill seeks to update.

Nor is expropriating land without compensation new. Section 25 of the Constitution provides for nil compensation in circumstances in which it is just and equitable. And the matter has been settled in law for the past 20 years.

In 2002 the Constitutional Court, In First National Bank of SA Ltd vs The Minister of Finance,  the Constitutional Court ruled that: “…there are appropriate circumstances where it is permissible for legislation, in the broader public interest, to deprive persons of property without payment of compensation.”

This Bill articulates the circumstances under which nil compensation would be just and equitable.

The Bill is not the loaded gun to chase landowners into the sea that the honourable members from the DA/FF+ society project it to be.

The campaign they launched against it during the public consultation process, warning that citizens stood to lose everything they own including their cars, was dishonest and inflammatory.

Surely the leaders of these parties cannot be so blinded by their privilege not to recognise the risks inequality poses to the security, stability and sustainability of the State.

The truth is that the Expropriation Bill is not the panacea for the all the ailments that afflict the land reform process in South Africa. That requires the relevant department to improve its performance.

But the Bill is a much needed improvement on the 1975 Act. In fact, it provides more protection of property rights than the Act it will replace because it is compliant with a progressive Constitution and Bill of Rights.

Twenty years, the Constitutional Court ordered that, “No one may be deprived of property except in terms of law of general application, and no law may permit arbitrary deprivation of property”, we support the Expropriation Bill.

Now let’s accelerate land reform.

Issued by Brett Herron, GOOD: Secretary-General & Member of Parliament, 28 September 2022