Posted on 10/20/2008 6:43:27 PM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa must intensify efforts to transfer farmland to blacks if it is to end crippling poverty among rural communities, ruling ANC leader Jacob Zuma said on Tuesday.
After the fall of apartheid in 1994, the African National Congress-led government set itself a target of handing 30 percent of all agricultural land to the black majority by 2014.
So far, however, it has only acquired 4 percent of land from private owners for redistribution, and says it needs to accelerate the process. Thousands of poor blacks are still waiting for farms promised to them by the ANC, which sees land redistribution as a cornerstone of black majority rule.
"We would not be transforming our country if we do not end the marginalisation of rural areas. That is why we will work to intensify our land reform programme," Zuma said in a speech at a metal workers union conference.
Land restitution is a sensitive issue in South Africa, troubled by the decline in agriculture in neighbouring Zimbabwe where white commercial farmers were often violently evicted by President Robert Mugabe's government.
Pretoria has vowed that its own version of this programme will be orderly.
Zuma said the land reform programme should be expanded beyond simply handing land to blacks, to include the development of rural areas.
"Land acquisition should be linked to clear rural development programmes, which will include infrastructure development to produce thriving rural economies and ensure sustainable development," Zuma said.
(Excerpt) Read more at africa.reuters.com ...
Great Idea! We have seen how well this approach has worked already! /s
When someone is digging them self into a hole—don’t take their shovel away.
The farms that have already been “re-distributed” have not proven to be productive.
As my brother says: There is a reason why there are two terms:
EmployER
EmployEE
One has many more skills than the other.
Will the last white farmer out of SA please turn out the lights ?
The key statement here is “South Africa must”.....not the United States.
Africa has gone from bad to....well....
The result will be exactly the same.
South Africa...another Zimbabwe in the making.
“Pretoria has vowed that its own version of this programme will be orderly.”
So it will be an “orderly” destruction of the nation that was once a star on the dark continent? Sounds like the “orderly” destruction of the Jews about 65 to 70 years ago.
With Zimbabwe right next door going to hell in a handcart we get this from South Africa. It would be funny if it wasn’t so pathetic. Although I expected as much. No intelligent person would have expected anything else. I wonder what the liberals who forced the changes upon South Africa would say now that the country is imploding? Why they don’t say anything or change the subject. South Africa tears the rug out from under so many liberal arguments that they wish it didn’t exist. No matter what the suffering in South Africa they will never admit that they caused the problems problems.
Every liberal socialist scheme fails miserably. It's always just a matter of time.
Then, the leftists rewrite the history books and start the plans to murder millions,.........again.
It doesn't enter their minds. They have become so accustomed to messes resulting from their shrill meddling that they just move on to the next cause they invent.
South Africa once provided jobs for many people in sub-sahara Africa. The liberals fixed that.
Mandela should have been shot a long time ago.
“South Africa must intensify efforts to transfer farmland to blacks if it is to end crippling poverty among rural communities,”
Zimbabwe, redux.
The South African government’s idea of “poverty alleviation” is crap.
This year and last year, I went on a road trip (http://www.panoramio.com/photo/9203500) to the Eastern Cape region of South Africa (called Transkei under apartheid) commonly known as the Wild Coast.
It is a totally beautiful part of the world, rolling green hills, powerful rivers, steep valleys, incredible beaches, surfable waves, waterfalls flowing right into the sea.
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/9204066
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/9203629
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/9204173
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/7160722
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/9203431
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/9204424
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/9204238
We drove for a few hours past the local inhabitants’ communities. The Xhosa people. This is supposed to be South Africa’s poorest area. But we saw great things, in our opinion.
We saw typically ethnic mud-brick homes with thatch coverings, they looked strong and were good to look at. They were everywhere.
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/9204221
They were painted blue and green (supposed to ward off the evil spirits).
Around the huts were local gardens, usually quite small with a home-made wooden stake fence surrounding it. Along with a few chickens, sheep and the odd donkey or such. We saw mielies growing along with fruit and vegetables.
In other words these are self sufficient communities. They pay no rent, and have no bonds. They may pay a small affordable fee to the local tribal chief however this may be payable in terms of cattle not currency.
Many of them have no electricity- and they do not need it from what we saw. This also frees them from paying such bills and from power cuts etc.
They collected water from one of the many rivers in the area or from rain water tanks.
They grow their own food. No need for large food stores or bills or advertising or queues.
People help eachother. Communal support. No strangers with the neighbours.
They live in a beautiful area.
They are and look HAPPY.
Now what value does one put on Quality Of Life??
Now comes the S.A. government with “poverty alleviation”.. they destroy the area’s natural beauty.. bring 9-5 jobs.. bring stress.. that was not there before.. destroy the local community support structures.. bring housing along with relatively expensive rentals and housing bonds.. people no longer work the land.. up come the ugly shopping malls.. liquor stores.. laziness.. boredom.. crime.. greed.. theft.
Myself and my friend stayed at a local backpackers in a typical Xhosa hut right by the beach. No crime. We felt safe. The hut was surprisingly spacious inside and very well insulated from the elements outside. We had fun and we had a great time. The locals were friendly and there were no beggars along the many kilometres of very rural sand-road we drove on. We saw people in the fields, tending to cattle, and so on.
These people in Dollar terms are poor yes.
But so what?
In Quality Of Life terms they are NOT poor.
This is the problem of South Africa (and Africa).
Rural men (and women) move to the large urban areas and cannot find jobs. They turn to crime. The rural areas they leave behind thus have deteriorating support structures.
Materialism is a culprit.
Sometimes Western ways are best left in the West.
Urbansiation is a culprit.
Apartheid brought about a few very developed urban areas in South Africa (Durban, Cape Town, Johannesburg-Pretoria) along with pockets of immense wealth.
Post-apartheid South Africa, along with false promises from the ANC, broken promises from the ANC, greed and corruption from the ANC, allied with intense materialism and greed thrown liberally around, leaves a financially poor mass of people who all hanker after the urban areas in search of money and work. They find some or none and turn to crime and theft and murder. Organised crime joins the part too while the government cares less.
Families break up. Children have no role models. Society breaks down. Add to this the ANC government’s ineptitude in letting in masses of Nigerians (can you say “drugs”) and masses of Zimbabweans due to mismanagement of the Mugabe situation, and you magnify this problem.
I live behind a high wall with an electric fence and infra-red beams in my garden, and a gun in my open safe at night, in Johannesburg, with private armed tactical response patrolling the streets outside, yet in the Wild Coast we slept with virtually unlocked doors in total safety.
Sometimes the really old ways are the best.
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