The fields on which James Roberts grazes cows and sheep are barely distinguishable from the miles of grassland that seem to stretch forever across the flat, parched landscape of the rural Orange Free State.
But this particular plot of land is special to the 300 or so members of the extended Witte family. They used to live there, their ancestors are buried there and they want it back.
“It’s our livelihood, our way of life. We are used to farm life. We are not used to township living,” said Hermans Witte, 39, who has lived in a black township squatter camp without work since being evicted 12 years ago from the farm he claims he owns.
Now Witte hopes that soon he will be able to go home.
South Africa’s new government, dominated by the African National Congress, has promised to restore land to blacks dispossessed during centuries of white domination. Today, 87 percent of South Africa is owned by the 15 percent of the population that is white.
But James Roberts has no intention of simply handing over the farm.
“As far as I’m concerned, they’ve got no claim whatsoever. It’s my land,” he said. “We’ve built up the ground there. You should have seen the state of the land when it belonged to them.”
More than 3.5 million blacks were forcibly removed from land designated as white after 1948, when the apartheid government came to power.
But apartheid only completed a process that had begun 300 years earlier, when the first white settlers arrived and began steadily driving blacks from the land.
In its election manifesto, the ANC pledged to redistribute 30 percent of South Africa’s land within five years to “effectively address the injustice of forced removals and the historic denial of access to land.”
Witte’s claim is among hundreds of cases expected to end up before the Land Claims Court, which the ANC has promised to establish as the legal vehicle to return land to dispossessed blacks.
The court would have wide-ranging powers to make judgments, using criteria that go far beyond strictly legal considerations. Issues such as the length of time a black community occupied the land, the presence of ancestral graves and the manner in which a white owner acquired the land will be taken into account, with the bias heavily in favor of returning land to blacks, even where formal ownership might be difficult to prove.
Where black claims are upheld, the court would be entitled to seize land but would have to compensate the owner.
During the election campaign, the ANC repeatedly reassured farmers that the government wouldn’t seize or expropriate privately owned white land that is being productively farmed. These promises played a big part in securing the acquiescence of conservative white Afrikaners in the election process and in heading off the white right-wing rebellion that was widely feared.
Instead, the ANC has said it hopes to distribute vacant, state-owned land to blacks without precipitating a backlash by whites. In addition, it has noted that 4 percent of the country’s arable land goes on the open market every year, which could be bought and made available for redistribution.
But now that the ANC is in power, blacks are expecting their land back while whites are confident that they will not be displaced.
“We’ve had mixed messages from the ANC,” said Sue Wixley of the National Land Commission, an independent group that campaigns on behalf of landless communities. “It could get very muddy.”
The Witte family doesn’t see any confusion. As far as Hermans Witte is concerned, President Nelson Mandela promised him his land back, and he gave him his vote on that understanding.
“If he fails to fulfill his promise, we’ll set him aside and look for someone else,” Witte said.
Roberts isn’t confused either; he is happy with what he has seen so far of the ANC government.
“Their policies seem very sensible,” he said. “They say that there’s enough state land to redistribute, without touching white land.”
But if the ANC did try to expropriate white land, he said, “It would be war for sure.”
This case illustrates the kinds of complexities that will confront the new land court, said Philemon Tsese of the Orange Free State Rural Committee, which helps landless blacks.
Legal ownership clearly resides with Roberts, he said. The Witte family said it was forced to sign the land away after being told by the government that the land had been identified as a “black spot” earmarked for forced removal.
But the court’s scope will mean that the family can argue that the land had been theirs for generations, and that they were only dispossessed because of discriminatory legislation.
Nonetheless, because the land is being productively used, the chances are that the court would uphold the Wittes’ right to the land but recommend that alternate land be found for the community, Tsese said.
“The likelihood is that white farmers will not be removed if there is alternative land available,” he said. “If you claim a piece of land where a successful commercial farm is producing for the country, it’s not wise to disrupt that because it would have a negative impact on everybody.
“But ordinary people won’t accept that, because they have historical and spiritual ties to particular pieces of land.”
Land represents more than just property or income to Africans; for cultural reasons, it is important to go home to die and be buried beside one’s ancestors.
The Wittes don’t want other land.
“We want exactly the same spot. We know the value of the land, the soil is good . . . and most important we must stay near our ancestors who are buried on the farm,” Witte said.
Wixley believes many blacks are going to be disappointed. “People are going to have to be realistic. The expectations of communities might not be met,” she said.
Advocacy groups also fear that the ANC’s promise to distribute existing state-owned land and land that comes onto the market was hastily made.
No one actually knows how much state land would be suitable for redistribution, but the World Bank has identified a mere 617,000 acres, a fraction of the 205 million acres currently owned by whites.
Experts say up to 1 million people may make specific claims, but there are also millions more landless peasants who are to be offered the chance to own land.
Joanne Yawitch of the Land and Agriculture Policy Center believes the pressures on the ANC from white farmers, business and the international community will prevent any widespread expropriations that might rekindle the threat of white rebellion and disrupt the agricultural sector.
“I don’t see any major political or social upheaval around the issue,” she says.
But if the ANC chooses to apppease white farmers rather than meet black expectations, it may face a backlash from those who voted it into power. Tsese says many landless communities are already threatening to reoccupy their land unilaterally.
It is an option Witte has thought of too. He said he was prepared to wait a few more weeks for the Land Court to be set up, but that he expected to be on the farm within a few months at most.
“If the government does not proceed quickly we will take the law into our own hands and take the farm by force, even if that means bloodshed,” he said. “It wouldn’t be easy, but we’re prepared to do it.”
