The ANC will test the argument that the Constitution already allows for expropriation of land without compensation in terms of section 25, the party's national executive committee (NEC) member Ronald Lamola said yesterday.

However, this was not stopping the party from continuing to look at whether this section of the Constitution should be amended, and making presentations to the constitutional review committee, reports BusinessLIVE.

This follows the ANC's two-day land summit held in Boksburg at the weekend. The party also called for the Expropriation Bill, which had been sent back and forth between former President Jacob Zuma and Parliament, to be passed immediately.

Lamola said the party was calling for a land redistribution Bill to be passed as well. The head of the ANC's subcommittee on economic transformation, Enoch Godingwana, said the outcomes and recommendations from the land summit were not binding. These were recommendations that would be taken to the ANC NEC meeting to be held this weekend.

Full BusinessLIVE report

The subcommittee is recommending the inclusion of expropriation without compensation in the Expropriation Bill, as it believed that the Constitution allowed the government to do so. The outcome of the two-day meeting will be discussed by the party’s highest decision-making body, the national executive committee (NEC), on Friday.

According to Business Day, Lamola said the party’s view – after the two-day land summit – was that section 25 as it stood allowed the government to expropriate without compensation, but the debate was that it had not been tested. ‘The discussion in the workshop was that after that Bill has been put in place we must look into the possibility of the President taking the Bill to the Constitutional Court … to test the constitutionality of the Expropriation Bill to expropriate without compensation.’

Lamola added the ANC needed to ensure that the constitutional review process was used to avoid ambiguity and bring greater clarity to section 25, if it was found that existing legislation impeded or slowed down effective land redistribution. As it stood, seven national departments, provincial governments and local municipalities had expropriation powers. ‘We must simply proceed to expropriate, and to do so without compensation in certain circumstances, and if they are challenged they must not be scared to go to court and clarify the principle,’ Lamola said.

The DA, however, claims the Expropriation Bill is flawed. Noting the Bill was sent back to Parliament by former President Jacob Zuma due to a lack of public consultation, DA spokesperson on land reform, Thandeka Mbabama, in a statement on the Politicsweb site, said the party will not allow the ANC to pass it without due process and consultation.

Full Business Day report (subscription needed)

Statement on the Politicsweb site

The possibility of a test case was widely welcomed by role-players and commentators. AgriSA chief executive Omri van Zyl is quoted in a Beeld report as saying the organisation is in favour of a test case as it would bring legal clarity. Professor Ben Cousins, of the University of the Western Cape, says there is broad agreement that the ANC should have done this earlier, and political analyst Ralph Mathekga bemoaned the fact that ‘an environment of distrust was created’. ‘Why did the ANC have to go to Parliament and drive the issue so strongly before it was tested in court?’

Full Beeld report (subscription needed)