Blacks Do Need Land

In a recent debate between Andile Mngxitama and Dawie Roodt the following things were said and I quote

Roodt‚ however‚ said according to research‚ fewer than 5% of black people in SA considered land to be the most important issue. “The most important issue is unemployment - we want jobs‚ we want to grow the economy in order to alleviate poverty in SA‚” said Roodt. 

Roodt said farms were not the place where wealth creation happened in a modern economy. “People do not want farms. People want to stay in cities‚ where they can have proper and decent jobs. We are not going to break agricultural land into millions of small pieces and settle millions of small farmers in SA‚” he said.

This narrative conveniently omits the full context of the land situation and how it was deliberately and nefariously designed to be that way by colonial minds.

 At the turn of the last century the mining industry was just emerging, and it was faced with a serious problem -- labour shortage. Natives were unwilling to work in the mines.

What was the reason? It was because they had access to economically viable land. Economically viable does not mean land to become a millionaire but land to feed your family and shelter them. They preferred to work their own land.

Organisations, such as The Witwatersrand Native Labour Association (WNLA commonly known as Wenela) and the Native Recruitment Corporation (NRC) were formed to recruit labour. WNLA had offices as far afield as Tanzania.

In the vast territory of Central and Southern Africa natives were not looking for jobs and didn't want jobs.

A look at the timelines is informative. In 1894 the chamber of mines wrote a report on the serious shortage of labour on the mines. Around 1900 WNLA and NRC were formed to recruit native labour as far and wide as possible.

About a decade later, in 1913, the Native Lands Act was passed. This act banned natives from owning land, or renting land from whites. It should be clear as a baboon's behind that the main objective of this act and other practices to stop natives from sustaining themselves or profiting from the land. It was a tool to turn the natives into cheap labour by denying them access to land.

Over the years, the law has been a huge success. Today most of the natives have got no other choice but to look for a job because they have got no economically viable pieces of land which could be an alternative to a job.

When economists like Roodt brazenly boast that black people do not want land but jobs, they are correct but the carefully skirt around the deeper reasons for that. People are now forced to think no further than their immediate basic needs - food and shelter for the very near future. Generations who have grown without access to land find it hard to envision how access to land will solve these basic problem.

They think the solution to food and shelter is a supermarket and money for rent.

It has taken generations to adjust natives to that mentality. Give them access to land and time to adjust they will soon learn that another solution is tilling the land and building houses with materials you find on your own or a neighbour's land.

I do not know whether is is out of ignorance or by design that Roodt omits the background of the iniquitous designs of colonialists that made sure that for the generations natives knew of no other alternative but to find a job.

If you give them the choice and opportunity it is quite possible for the natives to soon learn that land will not only provide an alternative means of sustenance, but enable you to be the master of your own time.

When you live on the land you work you cut your cost of living drastically. You no longer need transport every day. You also have extra time for other activities by cutting down on commuting time.

Land reform is absolutely necessary, not as a way of getting back at racist whites for past wrongs, but as a way of rebuilding a fair and equitable society from the wreck of past racist designs. Only a fair and equitable society can ensure future social stability for everyone.

Despite all it their might, past racist governments failed to enforce inequitable living standards forever. Today people should not think a black government can sustain the inequities where past racist governments failed.

Social imbalance will always lead to revolution. Ask the French, the Bolsheviks or the English. The Magna Carta was born out of bloody struggles over unfair land distribution.

Labour serfdom is not an alternative for South Africa today just as it was not an alternative for Britain those many centuries ago.