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South Africa's new president wants to redistribute land from white farmers


Simon Black


Feb. 21, 2018



Cyril Ramaphosa is sworn in as the new South Africa president at the parliament in Cape Town Thomson Reuters

Cyril Ramaphosa is South Africa's new president.
He replaced scandal-ridden Jacob Zuma.

"The expropriation of land without compensation is envisaged as one of the measures that we will use to accelerate redistribution of land to black South Africans," Ramaphosa said.

If you've been following much international news, you've probably heard that, after literally years of scandal, abuse, and incompetence, South Africa's president Jacob Zuma was finally forced to resign last week.

This is a big deal for South Africa.

The country has been suffering for nearly a decade under Zuma's corruption.

And people are certainly hoping that the new president, Cyril Ramaphosa, will represent a positive, new chapter for South Africa.

Yesterday Ramaphosa addressed the nation's parliament in Cape Town and made clear that his priority is to heal the divisions and injustice of the past, going all the way back to the original European colonists in the 1600s taking land from the indigenous tribes.

Ramaphosa called this "original sin", and stated that he wants to see "the return of the land to the people from whom it was taken… to heal the divisions of the past."
How does he plan on doing that?


Confiscation. Specifically-- confiscation without compensation.

"The expropriation of land without compensation is envisaged as one of the measures that we will use to accelerate redistribution of land to black South Africans."

Ramaphosa minced no words: he's talking about taking land from white farmers and giving it to black South Africans.
Astonishingly, he followed up that statement by saying, "We will handle it in a way that is not going to damage our economy. . ."

Wow, what a relief. For a minute it sounded like South Africa wants to do what Zimbabwe did several years ago.

Oh, wait a minute.

That's exactly what Zimbabwe did.

Seeking to correct similar colonial and Apartheid-era injustices in his country, Zimbabwe's president Robert Mugabe initiated a land redistribution program in 1999-2000.

Thousands of white-owned farms were confiscated by the government, and the farmers were forced out.

Bear in mind that Zimbabwe used to be known as the breadbasket of southern Africa. Zimbabwe's world-class farmers were major food exporters to the rest of the region.

But within a few years of Mugabe's land distribution, food production plummeted.

Without its professional, experienced farmers, the nation went from being an agricultural export powerhouse to having to rely on handouts from the United Nations' World Food Programme.

Hyperinflation and a multi-decade depression followed.
If there's an economic model in the world that you DON'T want to follow, it's Zimbabwe.

And you'd think that the politicians in neighboring South Africa would know that.

They had a front-row seat to the effects of Mugabe's land redistribution, not to mention they had to absorb millions of starving Zimbabwean refugees who came across their borders.

Yet this is precisely the policy that they want to adopt.
However you might feel about social justice, it seems pretty clear that copying Zimbabwe is a pretty stupid idea… and will only end up hurting the people they claim to be helping.

Yet the president claims that they want to initiate a land redistribution program that won't impact the economy or South Africa's food security.

Yeah sure. And I want to be the starting quarterback of the Dallas Cowboys next season.
But sadly you won't see Simon Black throwing any touchdown passes anytime soon.

That's because we have to live in a world with certain realities and limitations.

One of those realities is that land distribution, even if you believe the intentions to be noble, never works.

And of course, the most important reality is that anyone who willfully chooses to copy Zimbabwe's economic model deserves to suffer the consequences of their stupidity.

www.businessinsider.com/south-africa-cyril-ramaphosa-wants-to-confiscate-white-farmers-land-2018-2

South Africa was once a growing and thriving Nation, but then...

White Europeans decided to colonize it.

It's ok let them go back to starving but just don't ask for aid after they destroy the land again. When you take away what's working for the sake of wealth distribution it ALWAYS fails. If you wan't wealth then go out and earn it.

So they were starving before Europeans got there?

The remaining Afrikaners would be wise to gather whatever personal assets they can and get the hell out of there.

Easier said than done.

J/C

Dont really see how its any of our business - could care less about what they do politically - as long as they are not killing and bombing their children for no reason, etc. None of our business.

I have SA customers. They seem to like it very much there.

Jc

Yikes this could be a bad thing , a very bad thing . Trying to fix the past is not gonna happen . What will happen is pretty much the same thing that happened in Rhodesia...err..Zimbabwe which is a total dumpster fire of a country . What I never understood about Zimbabwe was that it isn't like they didn't have farmers , black African farmers who all of the sudden forgot how to farm so was it the people they turned the land over to had zero business sense ?

Think the big corporations will allow this or will there be a quick and violent change of leadership ? I'm betting on the latter .

It would be like turning the golf course over to the greenskeepers. They might be great on the land but not at running the clubhouse. And I'm sure the government found a way to profit wildly in this without any follow up support for the new owners.

I know you weren't trying to be racist but DAYUM that made me cringe .

Well in a way they are breaking out of systemic slavery over there so it wasn't meant to be racists but it has that overtone.

You just pulled the classic “black people aren’t smart enough...”

This is the kind of crap I be talking about. White people come to a place, THEY declare it to somehow be uncivilized and in need of saving. What they REALLY mean is “we like your stuff, we’re gonna take it”.

Then claim the the indigenous people there can’t do anything on their own without white peoples help.

As if nobody lived there prior to them trying to colonize the place.

But that’s white peoples for you. They find a way to “discover” places that already have people living here, too.

Not at all. When great farmers are displaced from their farm ownership for generations or even those with no other claim to farm land other than they are black are suddenly in charge of a farming operation for profit... well farms are tough to run with a lifetime of experience and great luck.

So no bro, not a racists thing at all.

They’ve been farming on the land for centuries before you know who decided to show up.

And you forget that a lot of those farms, while “owned” by white SF’s, are still maintained by a lot of black Africans.

In all likelihood, they know the land better than the people who own it.

And I didn’t mean to go off you bro so I apologize.

But I really need people to actually understand what went down over there. SF is the one place where you can make hard comparisons to the racism displayed here in America throughout history.

And it always seem to be mainly British and French demographics that are constantly involved in this colonial nonsense from back in the day.

US, multiple countries in Africa, China, India, Australia.

Like damn bro. I know it rains a lot in England and they always trying to find somewhere else to live, but that ain’t African people’s fault.

I guess they're not white land owners who apparently could lose everything they own.

There are a lot of other aspects to running a farm then just the growing part. There is a business side that involves the financials, sales, reliable yield forecasting for in growing season loans, and established relationships with buyers, suppliers, and lenders. These things can take years to develop and master. Just saying bro, there's a lot more to farming than planting crops.

It takes a combination of a pile of money, rock solid credit, heavy machinery, solid knowledge of all aspects of the business, and a ton of luck to run a competitive farm.

Now if you are running a glorified garden, all you need is a green thumb.

I agree. To an extent.

If a foreign nation does something that negatively effects our citizens or allies and those citizens or allies ask for our help, it is "our business".

Regardless, the whole South African story is SCREWED-UP.

The pompous, greedy, arrogant white ruling class screwed things up. Now it looks like the black, unsophisticated ruling class is going to make things worse.

The country has immense natural resources and should be the wealthiest nation on the planet. The country should be a utopia.

Instead it sure looks like it's going to be another miserable african country.

The dude who cares about Africa's starving children is here to tell you that apartheid is a good thing.

and that's "black peoples" for you, lumping all white people together no matter what part o the world they come from. Wow. racist much.

No Swish, it's not just white people. The whole southern part of the African continent back then was consistently at war with other tribes who were trying to take each others stuff and declare it for their own.

From what I understand they had some very fertile farm land but periodically would have bad droughts that could last a year or two and if it got bad enough, they would go to war with somebody who had more food and try to take it.. and, on occasion, it got bad enough that they resorted to cannibalism..

Down through history, this notion of going to war, invading, claiming things for your own, mistreating the locals is something that has gone on with every continent and every people.. the Africans did it, the Asians did it, the middle east did it, and white people did it.

In the case of South Africa, wasn't it primarily the Dutch?

did africans also start apartheid in SF? because that entire post is related to the main topic in this thread.

but i forget who i'm discussing these things on the board with. i'm always outnumbered anyway so it doesn't even matter.

i have zero problem with whatever it is the people decide to do. europeans came there and took crap by force.

and yet yall mad cause african people are returning the favor.

no, it was mainly british people, which is why they speak english there and not dutch. the brits already had settlements in Africa before due to the early period of the slave trade in the 1600's. then i think either late 18th century or early 19th century, they along with the dutch colonized SF.

i haven't read up on it in a while so don't shoot me over the timeline. but it is now mostly british descendants there.

I'm not mad bro.. they can do whatever they want. The whole premise of this article is that what they are trying to do was tried recently in the country right next door to them and it was an epic failure.

If they want to transfer land, increase black ownership of farm land, etc.. fine, do it. Just figure out a way to do it that is going to work.

I'm sure that Africans understood farming and the economics of farming when they controlled the farms in the 1700's and were primarily concerned with feeding themselves and the villagers closest to themselves... The fact that they still work the farms and know what it takes to grow green beans does not necessarily mean that they understand the economics of farming in 2018 with import/export, taxes, shipping, processing/canning, etc..

Nobody is saying they are too stupid to learn it, what people are saying is that going from working the farms to owning a large farming operation in one step is setting them up for failure..

Develop a slower transition plan that allows them to grow into the position of owning the farm rather than just handing it to them in one step...

No problem, I thought it was the other way around.. I thought the Dutch were first and got the ball rolling, then the Brits took an interest and became the bigger long term participant.. either way, that part really isn't all that important I guess.

Thanks

people are tired of slow, long drawn out processes, especially disenfranchised people.

its like i said in the gun thread, for better or worse, something will get done, because people are tired of being treated like second class citizens and want things changed.

it very well could be, but if you still look at the overall history, it does appear to be brits and french all over the place more so than the dutch and germans.

but to be fair, the the Mongols still outdid everybody.

I can sincerely understand that, there has to be a ton of emotion tied up in this for them which has built up for generations.. and I get it.

Maybe they need somebody who is not emotionally attached to this to advise them developing a plan... I would just hate to see them take 3 steps back and really throw the countries economy and food supply into a tailspin for a decade or so while they try to figure this out.

I'm sure the President has the best of intentions but I see this playing out as "worst case scenario".. You take 80 acres from wealthy white farmer and give ownership to an African family.. lacking the experience, African family isn't prepared to run 80 acre farm and it struggles mightily... Family isn't making any money, family can barely keep the farm afloat, family can barely feed themselves, this is playing out around the country so entire national economy is in trouble... Monsanto comes in and offers African family ten cents on the dollar for farmland and family takes it because they have to feed themselves today.. so now who won?

I know you get emotional and you lump all white people together and use words like "yall" etc.. but you have to trust me when I tell you that I'm not trying to deny Africans the right to own farms or make this take any longer than it has to.. I would just feel bad if they tried it and it failed because what might come after that failure, could be worse than what they have right now.

You take an 80 acre farm away from a family that has passed it down through the family for generations, a farm where family members are buried after lifetimes of making it a viable farm and somebody will get shot.

According to the NRA. lmao

Yet that family stole that farm to begin with. Oh the irony.

The family created a farm from where there was nothing.

They created land? Are they God?

Trust me, when I read this part...



My first thought was, this isn't going to HEAL anything.. it's just going to shift the resentment. You are going to have families that have owned and worked these farms for generations, lose their farm because of the way it was obtained 300 years ago.. I'm sure they aren't going to see this as "healing the divisions and injustice".. they are going to see it as some new injustice.. and yes, I fully expect it would cause a lot of resentment.. I do hope though that nobody gets shot.

Really? So your claim is that Africans didn't farm before the white man came there? You'll lie about anything.

So your claim is that there were large commercial farms in South Africa in the 1700s? You claim is that the dynamics of farming as an industry hasn't changed in 300 years?

I found one interesting stat.. in the early 1700s, there were 150,000 sheep on farms in South Africa, today there are 28.8 million...

So any attempt at equating the farms they lost in the 1700s to the farms that exist today is just silly.

Once again, as others have pointed out, you talk Bot.

Shame Bot.

that might be your point of view, but that isn't the point of view from the OP, 40, and others who ran up here acting outraged about it.

it also isn't the point of view from the people who have benefited from apartheid and have had these farms throughout generations, the same land that didn't belong to them in the first place.

i agree with you that maybe we should have someone independent of the entire situation oversee the transition, that way it doesn't turn into a train wreck.

but then it can easily turn emotional again when the convo becomes about WHO should be that "independent" person who isn't emotionally attached.

like who? another british person? dutch? a conservative American like 40?

i mean damn, i looked at the convo you guys are having about the production of the farms, and all i can do is smh.

we're acting like they haven't been farming before the europeans came here. we're acting as if somehow, them taking over the land, creating the apartheid era is somehow a GOOD thing because "look how many sheep farms they have now".

sorry bro, but thats on par with O'reilly's "the slaves were well fed".

you're now creating what YOU feel is suppose to be the standard of business, not considering that maybe those people were perfectly fine with their lifestyle and culture and how they lived prior to europeans coming there in the first place.

Actually Pit , I think I read years ago that White Dutch traders founded South Africa. When they arrived the area was vacant except for a few Black travelers. The Dutch started expanding Northward as the Blacks were expanding South. Thats when they bumped heads. The Dutch had their farms and also had Treckers who traveled all over with their herds. They became the Boors. Several big fights with Black tribesmen.

Maybe someone could look this up. I don't have the time or care enough to do it. Maybe OCD because he is very intelligent and knows everything about everything.

If I'm right and the Whites were there first. Well maybe we have a Native American situation. The land was stolen from the Whites.