Critics question call for amendments to address the land question in SA

JOHANNESBURG - While South Africa’s Constitution has been hailed as one of the most progressive in the world, some critics have questioned this calling for amendments to address the land question.

South Africa's painful past includes the reality of dispossession of land, with many not having seen any redress.

In 2021 the African National Congress (ANC) failed to get the necessary majority support to amend the constitution to allow for land expropriation without compensation.

But former Constitutional Court judge and freedom fighter Albie Sachs does not believe an amendment is necessary.

"I can tell you that the land redistribution in this country is completely unacceptable. I can tell you the special apartheid in the cities in some ways is a lot better, but in some ways its as entrenched."

The narrative that the South African Constitution is neoliberal and is out of touch with African problems and has its premise on what some call vagueness in addressing land restitution.

Sachs says that is simply not true.

But Sachs who was part of the ANC’s Constitutional Committee in exile admits the complexity of the issue.

"The issue we debated the most was land its hard by its very nature and is a limited resource taken by trickery by theft, by bribes, by bullying. It's hard and its deep."

At the same time as South Africa gears up for national polls next month at the top of the 8th Parliament’s agenda will be the implementation of the newly passed expropriation bill.