A Free State farm owner who unlawfully evicted a woman and her family during the Covid-19 lockdown has been ordered to rebuild the home he demolished, in what the Land Court has labelled a grave violation of constitutional and tenure rights.
The Land Court, sitting in Randburg, found that landowner Stephanus Francois van Niekerk and his company, Michael van Niekerk Eiendomme CC, had no legal grounds to eject the Khiba family from Quaggafontein farm near Ficksburg.
In an order granted on March 20, 2025, with reasons handed down on April 22 – Acting Judge Diana Mabasa condemned the eviction as “barbaric” and “callous”, and ruled that the family’s rights under the Extension of Security of Tenure Act were severely violated.
“The first and second respondents are ordered to take such steps as are necessary to reconstruct the demolished residential home within one month from the date of this order,” Mabasa directed.
The ruling was in favour of 62-year-old Manyaka Calastine Khiba, her daughter Karabo Mokhethi and niece Mathapelo Mokhethi, declaring their eviction from Quaggafontein farm unlawful and inhumane.
“The treatment of the applicants was callous in the extreme. It represents a shameful betrayal of the values enshrined in our Constitution,” Mabasa ruled.
The family was forcibly removed on November 6, 2020, without a valid court order, despite not being cited in the original eviction proceedings.
Their mud hut was flattened. Belongings were thrown on a dirt road and later taken to municipal storage, damaged and unaccounted for.
“They were left destitute, without shelter, in the middle of a global pandemic, as though they were nothing but debris to be discarded,” the judge said.
Khiba said she moved to the farm in 1988 with her late brother, a permanent worker. Her children were born and raised there. One is buried on the farm.
The eviction was orchestrated by landowner Van Niekerk and his company, who had cited only one family member in the Prevention of Illegal Eviction and Unlawful Occupation of Land Act application.
Also cited as respondents were the Sheriff of Ficksburg and the Setsoto Local Municipality, who carried out the eviction and stored the belongings.
“It is an abuse of the law to selectively cite one family member and then evict an entire household,” the court held.
The respondents argued only one person was occupying the land illegally, saying the court found overwhelming proof of their family’s longstanding residence.
The judgment found the eviction violated constitutional rights to dignity, housing, and security of tenure under the Extension of Security of Tenure Act. “The constitution is not suspended during pandemics. It is precisely in times of crisis that its protections must be most fiercely guarded.”
The court ordered that the Khiba family must be allowed to return to the land with full access to services.
Compensation for the damaged property must also be paid. The court’s tone was clear, this was not just a legal failure but a moral outrage.
“The right to dignity, security of tenure and adequate housing are not aspirational luxuries, they are foundational to our democracy.”
