Mthwalume farm goes up in flames
Inkosi Luthuli said delays in the process by the Department of Land Reform had endangered the Mthwalume land reform projects.
Some 66 ha of sugarcane at a farm in Mthwalume was set alight on Thursday last week, barely two weeks after a farm manager was burnt after being thrown into a blaze in the same area.
The arson attack comes despite the Land Claims Court’s intervention in the seven-year dispute over the farms.
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A meeting between the KwaZulu-Natal Land Claims Commission and the disgruntled claimants was held in Mthwalume, hours before the farm was burnt.
Police spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Thulani Zwane confirmed that a case of malicious damage to property had been opened at Hibberdene police station.
Just a day before the incident, the Mathulini Communal Property Association (CPA) was granted an interim interdict against the claimants, led by Mandlenkosi Radebe, in the Land Claims Court in Johannesburg,
Mr Radebe is a former member of the Mathulini CPA.
The order bars Mr Radebe and other respondents from ‘unlawfully interfering with, threatening or assaulting any applicants and entering properties owned by the Mathulini CPA’.
The interdict was taken by consent, on the understanding that Mr Radebe and the other respondents did not admit any wrongdoing.
Responding to allegations that the group may have been behind the fires, Mr Radebe said the matter was a legal dispute, adding that neither he nor other members were involved in any criminal activities.
“We did not set alight any farms or attack anyone. Inkosi Bhekizizwe Buthelezi is the one who hijacked the CPA when the government was conducting its land redistribution programme. Our lawyers are dealing with our claim in court.”
Inkosi Luthuli said delays in the process by the Department of Land Reform had endangered the Mthwalume land reform projects.
The Inkosi called on the minister of land reform Thoko Didiza, and police minister Bheki Cele to quickly restore law and order in the area.
The Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development portfolio committee said whilst they understood land restitution was highly emotive, violence should not enter the process.
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Portfolio chairman, Mandla Mandela said whilst they understood that the land restitution process was tied to the trauma, pain and suffering arising from historic dispossession, they could never allow violence to define a process that was intended to be ‘restorative, reconciling and healing’.
Mr Mandela appealed to all involved in land claims and restitution processes not to take the law into their own hands, regardless of the circumstances.
The Land Claims Court has set the matter down for October 30.
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