Land Dispossession Without Compensation

We are consistently told that it wouldn’t be possible to Dispossess the Land in South Africa from those who stole it without compensation. We are fully aware of Land negotiations at times by the local leadership with the colonial masters. Nobody can argue that the Power Relations were always slanted to the advance and advantage of the colonizers. That means, that any form of negotiations was always unfairly empowering the slave masters of Europe. We have to deal with these demons of the past as the Seed of the First Aborigines, the children of Autshumao and Krotoa.

Our endless talk without tangible change in the current circumstances is nonsensical. We collectively are much wiser and more intelligent than our Forebears, we must tackle the Land issues today. Yes, today from the 16th September 2017. Hopefully, someone will one day record that the ‘KhoiSan Land Repossession and Restoration’ project started with a few dedicated and focused cadres.

Let’s dive a little deeper into “Land Dispossession Without Compensation”. I would like to refer to it as Dispossession and not tone it down to Expropriation, because we must not be economical with the truth, it’s been too costly the last twenty-seven years in South Africa. Those amongst us who have been schooled by the Colonial system find it difficult to comprehend as someone said, you can’t change the system with the master’s tools and I’m paraphrasing. Why are some amongst us so stubbornly protecting the status quo? When we talk about markets that will be impacted or react negatively, who are the ‘Real Beneficiaries’ of the markets both locally and abroad? Please Sober up before you respond!

There is and was no noise when Cecil John Rhodes, that architect and structural engineer of British imperialism, dispossessed our San, Khoe, and later fellow Bantu-Nguni Africans of the Land that we started to Own (Custodians) collectively, no outraged when Rhodes dished it out to British colonial settlers. Nobody raised any alarm when Cecil John Rhodes proclaimed:

‘The clearing of the Land of Savages (referring to us, the Indigenous Africans) could be achieved in two to three years, with the aid of a certain number of machine guns. I contend that we are the First Race in the world. That the more world we inhabit the better it is for the human race. I contend that every acre of territory provides the birth of the English race and a greater portion of the world under our rule.’ Rhodes declared “White People” First Race! How much of that doctrine or indoctrination is still sitting pretty in the psyche of the colonizers?

There was strategic planning taking place amongst the European Colonizers. The Capturing of Africa did not happen through sheer luck or chance, it was well orchestrated and designed. If the Khoe, San, Coloured People’s Liberators are serious, we too will have to give our respect to our Forebears, who were the in Madiba’s word, were the “Curtain Raisers” of the Struggle for Freedom!

It was through the Berlin Act of 26 February 1885, where imperialist Western countries partitioned Africa into ‘British Africa’’, ‘French Africa’, ‘Portuguese Africa’, ‘Belgian Africa’, ‘German Africa’, ‘Spanish Africa’, and ‘Italian Africa’. To what extend do we know about this mostly concealed history. Coloured People are worse in the sense that every bit of information regarding our existence has been hidden, but it’s time to access the info to empower ‘ourselves and take our power back’. There was no Africa left for Africans, except modern Ethiopia. A tiny country like Somalia had the triple misfortune of becoming ‘British Somaliland,’ French Somaliland, and ‘Italian Somaliland.’ This laid the foundation for the present political chaos in Somalia.

Through colonialism, the riches of Africa, up to this day continue to fuel the economies of Europe and the world. When colonialism was fearlessly challenged by Africa’s people, the European colonizers retreated and in many cases ‘granted independence’, without economic ownership and control by Africans. Africans (which includes Coloured People) merely owned the flag and parliament. There were no reparations paid for the many years that the riches of Africa had and continue to enriched and develop Europe and now the world. Instead, African countries were strangled even today with what is/were termed foreign debts initially called by its camouflage name ‘Foreign Aid.’ African economies are still owned and controlled by their former colonizers who neglected the economic development of Africa and suppressed her technological advancement by making sure Africans remained backward educationally and, therefore, easily cheated.

Economically, European colonisers never meant Africans to fully repossess their continent and own its riches. For instance, over 50 percent of arable Land in Namibia is owned by less than 4,000 Europeans. In Kenya, many former Mau Mau fighters who fought their war of liberation against colonial dispossession recently won a case in a High Court in London for atrocities that British colonial government inflicted on them. Kenya still has a problem of Land dispossession 50 years after their fight for the liberation of their country. We need to seriously consider Legal Action on Mass and perhaps the legal brains amongst us will rise to the occasion. Our Liberation Cannot be Fought with a Colonial Mindset and with the ‘Tools of the Master’, its time to change gear. We cannot Fight with those amongst us who want to play a Protectionist role in favor of the status quo and to the advantage of their colonial masters because they have made financial investments in questionable and illicit markets. You cannot have your bread buttered on both sides. Many will have to draw a Line in the History of KhoiSan Coloured Land Restoration. You are now Officially on Notice.

So interesting to note that when Jan van Riebeeck told the Khoe & San Africans that they must reduce their cattle because there were not enough pastures for the cattle of the colonial settlers and those of the Indigenous Africans, the leader of the KhoiSan, Doman asked, ‘Who then, with the greatest degree of justice, should give way to LAND, the natural owner, or the foreign invader?’

He further asked: ‘If we (Africans), were to come to Europe, would we be permitted to act in similar manner you act here? It would not matter if you stayed at the ‘provision station’ [in Cape Town”], but you come out here in the interior. You select the best land for yourselves. You never ask us even once whether we like it or not, or whether it will disadvantage us.’

The Liberation of our Peoples Land Restoration was set in Motion by our Forefather Doman and others in discussion with the colonizers. Yet we are always made to believe that our Forebears didn’t Participate in the Resistance or Liberation of SA, we started it. It’s documented, we must just read and spend less time with emotional outbursts.

We will still have the Land Dispossession and Restoration Summit as planned before the year is done. This offering is to begin to stimulate conversations that is a necessary precursor for our engagement. It’s important that we prepare one another for the Colloquial on Land so that everyone can make a meaningful contribution. We will provide more discussion on a weekly basis. This is Part 1. Do you agree with us at IFNASA, “Land Must be Dispossessed Without Compensation and we need to Negotiate an Equitable Share of the Land?” Remember, even though we don’t fully subscribe to the S.A. Constitution, we do Recognize the elements of Fairness and Justice.

Welcome to the Land Debate!

Issued by: IFNASA