Land expropriation without compensation: End of amendment process in sight

• The ad hoc committee amending Section 25 of the Constitution is expected to adopt its report in the middle of March.
• The committee will meet twice weekly to conclude all its work.
• The report will then have to go to both houses of Parliament before the process can be concluded.

It is expected that next month the ad hoc committee amending Section 25 will adopt the bill to amend the Constitution to allow expropriation without compensation.

It is a parliamentary process, which started in February 2018, wound its way through the country twice, got derailed by the coronavirus and caused much public debate.

Now, it is finally drawing to a close.

The committee met on Wednesday and adopted its programme for the drafting of the constitutional amendment.

The committee finalised its nation-wide public hearings late last year, where it sought the input of the public on what form or format the constitutional amendment should take.

The process was near its end when Covid-19 reached South Africa, and the public hearings had to be postponed due to the lockdown and the necessity of social distancing.

Submissions

The committee also received written submissions.

According to a statement, committee chairperson Mathole Motshekga assured members that they are fully entitled to view all written submissions and, therefore, it will be made available.

Furthermore, he assured all political parties represented on the committee that their input will be treated equally, irrespective of the size of the party.

The committee resolved to attempt to meet at least twice a week to meet its deadline of next month to finalise and adopt the amendment Bill.

Committee members requested access to the volumes of written submissions made on the matter.

Given there are concerns that the committee's meetings are likely to clash with other committee meetings, Motshekga asked members to prioritise this committee.

"The land question is a build or break question for our country. We need to ensure that we deliver to the aspirations of all South Africans, black and white," Motshekga said, according to the statement.

The committee will meet on Friday to consider the report on the public participation and, thereafter, deliberate on the bill until 12 March 2021.

According to the programme agreed to, the committee is likely to adopt the bill on the constitutional amendments by 19 March 2021.

Thereafter, it will have to be tabled for debate and adoption in the National Assembly before it is sent to the National Council of Provinces.

The process, which set the bill in motion, started in February 2018 when the EFF brought a motion to the National Assembly that the Constitution be amended to allow expropriation without compensation.

The ANC, who adopted a resolution to that effect at its conference in Nasrec in December 2017, proposed an amendment to the EFF's motion, and this was accepted by a majority.

This set the constitutional review process in motion.

The Constitutional Review Committee crisscrossed the country in the winter of 2018. It also received a vast amount of written submissions.

In November 2018, the Constitutional Review Committee adopted a resolution that the Constitution should be amended to allow expropriation without compensation.

Lobby group AfriForum unsuccessfully went to court to prevent MPs from voting on the committee's report, and soon after both houses of Parliament adopted the report that recommended an amendment.

An ad hoc committee was established to draft this amendment, chaired by ANC MP Thoko Didiza, who has since been appointed agriculture, land reform and rural development minister.

This committee didn't make much headway by the time the Fifth Parliament rose because its term came to an end ahead of the May 2019 elections.

The Sixth Parliament was constituted in late May 2019, but the National Assembly only adopted a motion to establish a committee to amend Section 25 about two months later.

This committee had a deadline of March 2020, but this had to be extended.

With it unable to complete its work due to the pandemic, Parliament allowed the committee to lapse, only to re-establish it later.