[MEDIA INVITE] #NoToEvictions Picket

Date:Thursday,02August2018
To:AllMedia
Attention: News Editors/Land Reporters

For Immediate Use

More than 20,000 people are threatened by farm evictions in the Western Cape. Farm dwellers will picket outside the final public hearings to be held in Cape Town to call on President Ramaphosa to keep a promise he made in Paarl in 2014: that there will be a moratorium, an immediate ban on legal and illegal farm evictions.

Tshintsha Amakhaya is calling on President Cyril Ramaphosa to immediately suspend all farm evictions in a formally signed moratorium which guarantees concessions to be awarded when the moratorium is breached and penalties levied against those involved in farm evictions.

On 4th August 2018, the last public hearings are to be held at Friends of God Church in Goodwood (Cape Town) by the Constitutional Review Committee to review Section 25 of the Constitution and other clauses necessary to make it possible for the state to expropriate land in the public interest without compensation.

Tshintsha Amakhya members in the alliance with farm dwellers and workers will hold a demonstration outside the Friends of God Church on Vasco Blvd before and during the public hearings.

This demonstration is spurred by the news that over 20 000 people are threatened by farm evictions in the Western Cape. The Drakenstein Municipality has about 1,127 pending eviction matters.

Meanwhile, there are thousands of illegal evictions of farm workers and other farm dwellers that continue unabated across the country despite the clear protections contained in the Extension of Security of Tenure Act 62 of 1997 (‘ESTA’).

About 300 farm dwellers will join forces in reminding the President to honour his promise made in Paarl in 2014 following massive workers strike that there will be a moratorium as an immediate ban on all farm evictions.

There is a common understanding amongst the members of the alliance that this round of evictions, happening at large scale, is very linked to the talks about expropriation of land without compensation and the evictions that took place in 1997 when ESTA was adopted. Therefore, the alliance understands that there is historical continuity that should be put into perspective that whenever there is an announcement that has possibilities of restructuring the existing agricultural sector, farmers respond by evicting people.

Tshintsha Amakhya further demands that the Western Cape farms be used as the testing ground for land expropriation without compensation.

20 000 LIVES MATTER!

Tshintsha Amakhaya