Concerns around farm evictions, reports of human rights abuse on farms, and legal access for farm workers, dominated the Foundation for Human Rights (FHR) workshop on 18 April 2008 in Pretoria.

Titled ‘Farm Dwellers Legal Access Crisis Workshop’, the event brought together representatives from NGOs and government to discuss the difficulties farm dwellers face when accessing legal services.

The workshop took place in the wake of the announcement in January by the Association For Rural Advancement (AFRA), that it is shutting down its legal service cluster partnership and referring all its new clients to the relevant government departments as of February 2008.

In a press statement, AFRA states that since the enactment of the Land Reform (Labour Tenants) Act No. 3 of 1996 and the Extension of Security Tenure Act No. 62 of 1997, the Departments of Justice, Land Affairs, and Agriculture, have failed to protect the rights of the families living on farms.

Reiterating this view, Nkuzi Development Association argued in its Evictions Survey, that there are few NGOs in the country working in the land sector and they have limited resources to enable them to lobby and advocate for the rights of farm dwellers.

Speaking at the workshop, Department of Land Affairs (DLA) Chief Director: Strategic Management & Technical Support Services, Vela Zimele Mngwengwe, pointed out that his department contracted Mediation & Transformation Practice at a cost of R9 124 480 to render mediation services on its behalf for three years, as well as Cheadle Thompson & Haysom for R32 902 109 to manage legal services for the same period. 

Landless People Movement’s (LPM) Shadrack Khubeka warned that farmers will continue to evict farm dwellers because they know that they do not have lawyers.: “These lawyers are representing us (farm dwellers) not defending us”, said Khubeka. He urged NGOs working with farm dwellers to unite in order to confront farmers and ensure that they have access to legal services. 

Rural Legal Trust (RLT) pointed out that private attorneys could further marginalise farm dwellers because they do not visit communities to look for cases, but wait for the communities to report cases to them.

RLT National Programme Manager, Lethlogonolo Gaborone, maintained that, “There is a problem when the government utilises services of private legal entities to deal with farm evictions.”

The DLA came under heavy criticism from NGOs for failing to provide leadership and to consult them on matters relating to access to legal services for farm dwellers. They argued that there is little understanding regarding this intervention and the role that civil society is expected to play in complementing or partnering with government to ensure effective legal service to farm dwellers. 

Women On Farms Project (WFP), Executive Director, Fatima Shabodien, whose organisation works with women in commercial agriculture in the Western Cape, contends that outsourcing state services to private companies is problematic. 

Shabodien stated that farm workers fear they might be evicted at any time, and that communities are now asked to provide evidence that they own the land each time a land claim is made.

According to Nkuzi Development Association, elderly people are being evicted from the farms without eviction orders and are denied the right to bury their loved ones on farms. The organisation claims that in certain instances, farmers demolish their houses and sometimes offer them little compensation to find a new place to live outside the farms.

Sharing his experiences Nkuzi Development Association, project officer, Joseph Shivambu, said that in Lanseria, south of Johannesburg, the government evicted land occupiers and provided them with ‘temporary’ land to live on. Shivambu says such places are not conducive to human life.

Responding to this, Mngwengwe has urged civil society to consider whether they want government to play a third-party role. Mngwengwe maintains that the DLA will literally run its own law firm when the three year agreement with the said legal firms lapse, since the Legal Aid Board (LAB) does not have the capacity to deal with cases involving farm dwellers.

– Butjwana Seokoma, Information Services Coordinator, SANGONeT.

 – Picture courtesy of Nkuzi Development Association