Trade union Solidarity says the Gauteng government is jumping the gun by wanting to expropriate idle private land without compensation.
Werner Human‚ deputy chief operations officer of the union’s legal services‚ warned that the announcement made by the Gauteng government was inappropriate because it skipped a parliamentary process already underway to deal with the land issue.
“The Gauteng government is jumping the gun. We are all subjected to the parliamentary process on the issue of expropriation without compensation. Parliament has not yet legislated or amended the Constitution‚” he said.
“They are jumping the gun … at the most they will be contravening the law… (the) Gauteng provincial government must retract that statement. They can submit whatever they want to Parliament but they should retract that statement and must be subjected to the (parliamentary) process like we all are‚” said Human.
Gauteng Premier David Makhura announced this week that provincial government was completing an audit of all unused privately owned land and planned to go ahead with expropriations to test the Constitution‚ instead of waiting for the parliamentary process to take its course.
He said expropriated land would then be given to residents who want to use it for building houses‚ food production and industrialisation.
Land expropriation? Not so fast‚ says Solidarity
Trade union Solidarity says the Gauteng government is jumping the gun by wanting to expropriate idle private land without compensation.
Werner Human‚ deputy chief operations officer of the union’s legal services‚ warned that the announcement made by the Gauteng government was inappropriate because it skipped a parliamentary process already underway to deal with the land issue.
“The Gauteng government is jumping the gun. We are all subjected to the parliamentary process on the issue of expropriation without compensation. Parliament has not yet legislated or amended the Constitution‚” he said.
“They are jumping the gun … at the most they will be contravening the law… (the) Gauteng provincial government must retract that statement. They can submit whatever they want to Parliament but they should retract that statement and must be subjected to the (parliamentary) process like we all are‚” said Human.
Gauteng Premier David Makhura announced this week that provincial government was completing an audit of all unused privately owned land and planned to go ahead with expropriations to test the Constitution‚ instead of waiting for the parliamentary process to take its course.
He said expropriated land would then be given to residents who want to use it for building houses‚ food production and industrialisation.