The land question in smallholder development in South Africa - Institutional Constraints to Small Farmer Development in Southern Africa - page 172

to achieve the 30% black ownership of land is now hinged on the 'willing buyer, willing seller'
modality, the approach was not discussed in earlier documents articulating black positions
for a negotiated settlement of the political crises in South Africa based on which the new
constitution was drafted and ratified (Lahiff, 2005 and FW De Klerk Foundation, 2007).
As Lahiff (2005) noted in a policy brief of the Programme for Land and Agrarian Studies
(PLAAS) of the University of the Western Cape, this modality for land redistribution,
which is a variant of the market-assisted approach, was not presented as an option in the
ANC documents entitled: Ready to govern (produced in 1992 as the Constitutional Talks
were picking up), and the ANC Manifesto, The reconstruction and development programme
(RDP) which was issued in 1994.
In fairness to it, the RDP document had made no secret of the ANC's determination to
fundamentally alter the pattern of land distribution and ownership in the country as part of
a programme of agricultural restructuring and democratization. There was a clear awareness
of the fact that, despite the enthronement of democratic rule, the effects of decades of
apartheid rule were still present in the form of well-laid infrastructural networks and know-
how built over many years with substantial state subsidization (Matabese, 1993; Mbongwa
et al. , 1996; Kinsey and Binswanger, 1996.). Much of this insight obviously came from the
conclusions of the Land redistribution options conference organized by the World Bank and
the Land and Agriculture Policy Centre of Witts University during 12-15 October 1993
in Johannesburg. But by failing to clearly specify the model for land redistribution and put
it out in the public domain and allow discussions and debate on its operability and possibly
expose its contradictions, a unique opportunity was lost. If such debate would have been
held, it perhaps would have been possible to identify the multiple factors, including the
inherent short-comings of the willing-buyer-willing-seller modality. It can also be argued
that the conclusions of the Land redistribution options conference , which included the
introduction of the 'market-assisted land reform programme, came too late in the run up
to the transfer of power to the ANC government and therefore did not allow enough time
for full examination.
As Lahiff (2005) suggested, a willing-seller-willing-buyer model in the South Africa that
was emerging from an apartheid regime was a rude joke since the white owners clearly did
not have any 'willingness' to part with their land. At the same time, the 'willingness' of
blacks to buy the land was meaningless in the absence of the financial means to do so. In
the first place, the white owners were under no obligation to sell their land on concessional
terms to specified prospective beneficiaries. On their part, the prospective black buyers
depended on the state's approval of their application to secure loans to make the purchase.
In the meantime, an army of consultants drawn largely from the white community was
ostensibly providing support to prospective black buyers to develop business plans based
on which loan applications were evaluated. All the elements that could scuttle and slow
down the process were therefore in-built within the policy. In addition, the policy did not