ABC leader calls for land to be given back to Monarchs as customery custodians
By CELANI SIKHAKHANE
Former president, Jacob Zuma’s closest ally, businessman, Philani ‘PG’ Mavundla has joined the call for the return of land to its original owners, the different Monarchs of all native groups instead of the state.
Mavundla, who was recently elected as the new leader of Abantu Batho Congress (ABC) at the party conference which took place in Newcastle, told ABC delegates that the land should not be expropriated to the government.
“The illegitimate Republic of South Africa founded in 1910 through the amalgamation of four white settlers which was made of Natal and Cape British Colonies, Orange Free State and Transvaal Dutch Colonies was a culmination of a long brutal series and violent dispossession from the native inhabitants by the alien European colonial invaders,” said Mavudla who was previously an ANC mayor of Greytown.
“The ABC views land redistribution as an indispensable first step towards rectification of historical crimes by colonizers. We therefore believe that the land needs to be expropriated to the Monarchs of this country as the rightful owners of land that was stolen during the arrival of the settlers,” Mavundla added.
The stand by ABC on the issue of land comes after a high level panel which was led by former president, Kgalema Motlanthe made a recommendation in 2017 to the state that it should repeal Ingonyama Trust.
The call to repeal Ingonyama Trust forced the late King Goodwill Zwelithini kaBhekuzulu to make several calls to the state that it should stay away from the land which is owned by Ingonyama Trust.
Mavundla said that in terms of the precolonial African land tenure system, Monarchs were not and still not the private owners of the land and certainly have never had the authority to sell instead they are custodian of land on behalf of the people with the power to allocate.
He also warned government about the expropriation of land without compensation that it is not going to happen if the state does not nationalise banks first.
“Most of the land is owned by the banks and those who happened to own a piece of land, they owning it through millions of loans from the banks. We therefore call for the nationalisation of banks so that it will be easy to amend section 25 of the constitution and expropriate the land without compensation.
“That is where the land will be expropriated and redistributed to its rightful owners who were disposed during the arrival of the Colonizers in 1652,” said Mavundla.
He also believes that the urban land which falls under municipalities should be redistributed to black people.
Mavundla is a former ANC KwaZulu-Natal heavyweight. He made headlines in 2016 as the first mayor to refuse the salary while he was an ANC councillor in Greytown.
He later left the ANC and became a National Freedom Party (NFP) councillor but he resigned and formed the ABC in 2020.
