In the last six months the State has spent over R700-million on buying land for restitution purposes, the Acting Chief Land Claims Commissioner Blessing Mphela said on Wednesday.

"The fact that we continue to spend more money on less hectares of land as a result of high land prices is a challenge for the commission," he told a media briefing at Hartebeespoort.

He said since 1 April a total of 165 claims had been settled and this brought the total of settled claims since 1995 to the end of September this year to 74 912 in all provinces.

He said just over R726-million had been paid out for 93 420 hectares of privately-owned land and the target set was close to five million ha within the next two years.

The national average cost per hectare under review is R7771.56.

"The question is whether we can as a nation afford to buy land at this cost," he said.

Mphela said about R17-billion had been allocated to achieving the target. However, this amount was purely for the purchasing of land and did not include any developmental initiatives.

"That is only for land acquisition – it goes into the hands of the land owners – but for development we will probably need much more."

The economic ratio needed for development was R2 for ever R1 spent on land restitution and this required much larger investments.

More challenges facing land claims

Other problems that the commission continued to face was the amount of time taken to resolve claims in the Land Claims Court and disputes involving communities and traditional leaders.

Mphela said across the country a total of 167 claims were currently before the court.

"The lengthy process involved in dealing with cases that are before the courts means that we cannot finalise such claims until legal process has run its course."

Pertaining to the disputes, he said the commission continued to conduct workshops and meetings with traditional leaders to address the issue of malcontent.

"Some traditional leaders are opposed to the establishment of legal entities for the purpose of settling claims instead preferring that the land be handed over to the traditional authority on behalf of the community instead of the community property associations."

He said some of the concerns the commission had regarding the traditional authority was that in some cases they were part of a political party and this created an obstacle in that the State could not be seen to be giving a party property.

"As you'll recognise, this challenge is a huge one," he said.

Sapa