The war between the Department of Land Reform and Rural Development and the Izwi Labantu Forum (ILF), a lobby organisation fighting for marginalised black farmers and disadvantaged South Africans, has reached new heights.
The department and ILF met to discuss issues faced by black commercial farmers regarding exploitation and threats allegedly made by land reform and rural development officials.
After Sunday World published the story about the plight of black farmers two weeks ago, the department took a bold move to contact the ILF regarding the issues of exploitation and threats allegedly made against the farmers, but the matter escalated to the boiling point.
The department and ILF met on November 13 to discuss allegations and possible solutions regarding issues faced by black farmers.
Sunday World understands that the meeting went well, as both parties agreed on certain terms to deal with the challenges faced by the farmers.
However, things took a nasty U-Turn a few days after the meeting when the ILF requested a follow-up meeting to discuss case by case pertaining issues raised by the commercial farmers who are disgruntled with the department led by minister Mzwanele Nyhontso.
On November 26, Clinton Heimann, an acting director-general from land reform and rural development wrote a letter to the ILF pointing out that if the lobby group continued with the alleged blackmail to approach the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) to conduct investigations on claims of ill-treatment against the department’s officials on allegations of irregularities and misconduct, the department would not be part of such.
“You indicated that Izwi Labantu intended to proceed with an approach to the SIU.
“You were advised that if the SIU is seized with a matter under a Presidential Proclamation, the department’s own forensic and internal audit structures are required to align with that mandate and cannot run parallel processes that interfere with the SIU’s work,” said
Heimann.
ILF chairperson Norma Mbatha responded to the department and said the organisation had not blackmailed anyone or the department.
Sunday World has established that the department failed to respond on Thursday to the matter of dealing with each case as per the issues raised by the ILF.
