Legislation: Constitution Amendment Bill hearings ‘fruitful’

The purpose of nationwide public hearings on the draft Constitution 18th Amendment Bill is to hear from ordinary South Africans ‘how’ section 25 ‘should be worded’ to provide explicitly for expropriation without compensation for land reform purposes. This was confirmed in a media statement on Sunday’s hearings in Ermelo, Mpumalanga province. Quoting the ANC’s Bongani Bongo, the statement tends to suggest that some attendees were under a different impression. Bongo was speaking in his capacity as leader of a delegation of members of the National Assembly ad hoc committee responsible for developing the draft Bill, notes Pam Saxby for Legalbrief Policy Watch. 

The statement is one of four released yesterday on public hearings conducted last weekend – the other three having taken place in Bloemfontein and Bethlehem, Free State province, as well as Middleburg, Mpumalanga. ‘Fruitful’ though they may well have been, the hearings appear to have been attended by many people simply wanting either to express their unreserved support for land expropriation without compensation – or their opposition to it. Against that backdrop, the statements mention only one proposal with implications for the wording of the amendment: that it should include ‘a cap on the size of land any individual should be allowed to own’.

More generally, there were calls for ‘the expeditious finalisation of the constitutional amendment’ given that – in the view of ‘some’ participants – ‘economic freedom … comes with land’. ‘Demands’ for the ‘equal distribution of mineral and other natural resources such as water’ were presumably made in that context. Government has yet to explain how these expectations will be managed.