Zulu monarch and AfriForum unite over land

Controversial Afrikaner rights lobby group AfriForum is looking to partner with Zulu King Goodwill Zwelithini to promote agriculture as well as in their shared opposition to proposals by the government to expropriate land without compensation.

AfriForum CEO Kallie Kriel told TimesLIVE on Tuesday that the lobby group believed that there should be cooperation among communities at grass-roots level to promote agriculture to ensure food security in the country.

“We are looking forward to working with His Majesty the Zulu King and the Zulu people as we believe that there should be cooperation at grass-roots level based on mutual intervention and respect among communities‚” said Kriel‚ who was one of the guests at the king's 70th birthday in July.

He said there were many AfriForum members who had farming operations adjacent to land under the Ingonyama Trust and they were already assisting the king with a pilot project to assist emerging farmers with support and farming production.

“We have been helping the king with a pilot project. It’s still in the beginning phase and our members support progress where people want to farm and to build farming production in the area of the Ingonyama Trust‚” said Kriel.

Both King Zwelithini and AfriForum are vehemently opposed to the ANC government proposal for expropriation of land without compensation.

However‚ Kriel said AfriForum had not discussed the matter with the Zulu monarch but both believed that expropriation of land without compensation would be detrimental to everybody in the country.

“We have not spoken on that issue. But we believe it would be to the detriment to everybody in this country we have seen what happened in Zimbambwe‚” said Kriel.

King Zwelithini announced on Sunday during the Shaka Day celebration in Durban that he would be partnering with AfriForum to promote agriculture and ensure food security in the country.

“The Zulu nation I’m talking about will not exist if we don’t have food. That’s why I say farmers must come closer so that we discuss what we can do when we talk about agriculture and the availability of enough food in the land.

“That’s why I’m asking AfriForum of the Boers to come and help us‚ as they’ve introduced themselves to me that they are willing to work with me and my father’s people to uplift agriculture in our land in order to have food. Because when government started talking about the appropriation of land expropriation without compensation‚ Boers downed tools. There is no food in South Africa‚” the king told his subjects.

He said was still waiting for a follow-up meeting with President Cyril Ramaphosa to finalise their discussion on the land under the control of the Ingonyama Trust.

In July Ramaphosa bowed to pressure from the Zulu king by assuring him that the ANC government had no intention of expropriating land under the control of the Ingonyama Trust.

Ramaphosa’s assurance was in conflict with the recommendation of a government-appointed high-level panel led by former president Kgalema Motlanthe that the Ingonyama Trust be scrapped

In its submission to the Constitutional Review Committee on whether section 25 should be amended to allow expropriation of land without compensation‚ AfriForum said it was the “biggest historic fallacy” that whites stole the land.

The forum said expropriation without compensation was built on “the false argument that the eroding of property rights and tampering with healthy market principles will lead to economic growth.”