Adequate judicial oversight by an ordinary court of law (and not the new Land Court with its watered-down version of due process) must always be present.
The Communal Land Tenure Bill should be refined to grant traditional communities true private ownership, free from back-door state control, by removing provisions reserving land for the state.
requirements, abolishing capital gains tax, and capping property rates. This will reduce the high cost of being a property owner, especially for the indigent who are necessarily excluded. Restrictions on agricultural land subdivision should also be repealed to enable affordable access to rural property in particular.
Finally, and perhaps most contentiously, Parliament should divest state ownership of natural resources like water, minerals, and petroleum by amending the National Water Act, Mineral Resources Development Act, and Upstream Petroleum Resources Development Act. These resources, now mismanaged by the state for decades, and increasingly utilised for partisan political purposes, should return to prior owners or be transparently
buyers to be secure in the knowledge that the rent-seeking state will not come knocking again. The Communal Land Tenure Bill should be refined to grant traditional communities true private ownership, free from backdoor state control, by removing provisions reserving land for the state or granting the executive excessive discretion in communal land matters. The Bill should then be placed back on the parliamentary agenda.
Government must audit all state-owned or controlled property and commit to transferring ownership to lawful occupants, as demonstrated by the FMF’s Khaya Lam Project. Khaya Lam has just achieved the milestone of facilitating over 20,000 title deed transfers to rightful owners since 2010. This is real empowerment. The aforementioned Restitution Act, furthermore, should be strengthened. Time limits for claims should be removed, and funding increased to ensure the land claims process is swiftly and adequately completed. Restituted properties must henceforth be immune from any further land reform consideration, enabling the new owners and
recognised as truly abandoned by a court of law, or (vanishingly rare) exceptional cases justified under section 36(1) of the Constitution. Adequate judicial oversight by an ordinary court of law (and not the new Land Court with its watered-down version of due process) must always be present. To foster equitable land access, the FMF further recommends, Parliament, provinces, and municipalities should liberalise property transactions by outsourcing deeds registries, eliminating fees, waiving formal building plan New homeowners in Phiritona, Heilbron, registering to collect their title deeds
Housing in Tumahole, Ngwathe (Parys) where the FMF initiated Khaya Lam
October 2025 | Issue 141 | Asset Magazine 325
324 Asset Magazine | Issue 141 | October 2025
Made with FlippingBook Ebook Creator