Land reform

[ians]

Everyday I read and watch land reform threats.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPJ53EUqoWI&ab_channel=DemocraticAlliance

I read and watch like this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwij0b2LvYM&ab_channel=MorningShot

The question is are these old ways of doing things like shop malls (were your brokers are investing your funds) ... going to become like video hire or faxes.

Do we need to start looking at changing the way we do things.

From when I was young ... there was a set way of doing things and it is just how the old people did it ..

Go to school

Get a job

take out life insurance and a pension fund

and work fingers to the bone until you are 65

Then retire

cash in your investment which if worth what they predicted ... would mean you would have so much money you wouldnt know what to do with it all or you could live till 150 before you would spend it.

The only catch ... at 65 ... your life is over ... you too sick from all the pollution ... the stress because thanks to all the market crashes ... your investment barely cover the cost to pay off your bond that you have extended every year to try survive blah blah blah.

Now with all the new challenges ... and a chance you may never see your pension ... your house/farm that you have invested in for the past 40 years might not be yours ... who knows maybe in the next few years ... we go onto a 99 year rental system or you just loose it.

I am thinking start winding down everything ... plan a nice holiday ... spend a couple years drifting/travelling enjoying life ... this bullshyte that working hard is the way to success ... dream on ... if that were the case I wouldnt be sitting smashing my keyboard for a bunch of aliases to read ... I would have become a millionaire a long time ago.

This way of living is no longer suitable for the 21 century ... maybe start unloading the baggage ... find better ways to save a little for a rainy day.

What do you think?

[Blurock]

Land reform or actually land grabs, is part of the piracy agenda of the current government.
The Ain't NO Consequences* party has adopted the Chinese model as stated by Ramaphosa at the Zondo Commission. So in other words communism?
*(they keep on stealing with no consequences to the corrupt officials).

Although they want to paint a different picture, It is clear that the long term goals of the Ain't No Consequences party is socialist communism. If you don't believe this, just read these two books on how to create a socialist state by Saul Salinsky, author of "Rules for Radicals" and "Reveille for Radicals". According to him, there are eight levels of control that must be obtained to create a social state;

1. Healthcare - control health care and you control the people. How long have they not tried to implement a National Health Care programme?

2. Poverty - Increase the poverty level as much as possible and increase dependency on grants and subsidies. Poor people are easier to control and will not fight back while you provide everything for them. Are the unemployment levels not at a record high already? R350 per month for the jobless?!

3. Debt - Increase debt to unsustainable levels. Increased taxes will create even more poverty and more dependency.

4. Gun Control - Remove the ability of civilians to defend themselves. Enables the creation of a police state. This has also been on the cards for a long time. (Bheki Cele and the Firearms Control Amendment Bill, 2021).

5. Welfare - Take control of every aspect of civilian life; Food, housing and income. Social welfare programs in South Africa include cash assistance, unemployment insurance, medical provisions, and housing subsidies. ... The cash assistance programs that are currently available include the Child Support Grant, the Foster Child Grant, old-age pension, disability grant, and war veterans grant etc etc.

6. Education and Media - Take control of everything that people read or listen to. Take control of what children learn at school. Education in South Africa is governed by two national departments, namely the department of Basic Education (DBE), which is responsible for primary and secondary schools, and the department of Higher Education and Training (DHET), which is responsible for tertiary education and vocational training. There has been objections against private schools.

7. Religion - Remove the belief in God from schools and government. Starting the school day or parliament or a function with prayer is a thing of the past.

8. Class Warfare - Create division between the wealthy and the the poor. The discontent will make it easier to tax the wealthy with approval from the poor. Are we not seeing more of this every day? This also promotes racism and widespread Xenophobic violence.

Are we not seeing all these rules being applied in our country today? Do you really think that this is not happening?

[adrianh]

There is more to land reform.

Watch this video by John Oliver. He explains the issue in America - We have the exact same issue here whether we will admit to it or not.

Housing Discrimination: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-0J49_9lwc

[Blurock]

There is more to land reform.

Watch this video by John Oliver. He explains the issue in America - We have the exact same issue here whether we will admit to it or not.

Housing Discrimination: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-0J49_9lwc

I admit I did not watch the video as I read fast and prefer not to spend time listening to discussions.
Housing discrimination in South Africa has terminated with the previous government and there is no restriction on anyone meeting the financial criteria required by any lender to assess the risk of a bond or loan.

Housing discrimination however, still exist due to rural patronage and the paternal feudal system where a king or chief gives you permission to occupy or build a home. The property rights of the 18 million rural people living in the former homeland areas are systematically being dispossessed of their precariously held property rights. The past decade has seen major battles between the courts and government over land reform. The government has continually ignored these judgments or intervened on the side of traditional leaders and other elites.

A glaring example is the Ingonyama trust;

Wikipedia ...established to administer the land traditionally owned by the Zulu people, represented by their king, for the benefit, material welfare and social well-being of the Zulu nation, who continue to occupy the land as they historically have done.[1] The Trust owns 29.67% of the land in KwaZulu-Natal, which is equivalent to 28,000 square kilometres, or 10,811 square miles.[2]

This land was supposedly granted to the Zulu Nation by the Nationalist Govt in an attempt to get Dr Buthelezi to agree to a Zulu homeland.

The high court in Pietermaritzburg has recently declared the Ingonyama Trust Board’s (ITB’s) residential lease programme unlawful and has ordered it to pay back millions of rands it has collected from residents since 2012.

The rent-seeking practices of the Ingonyama Trust in KwaZulu-Natal are a local variation of a wider theme of government empowering traditional leaders to treat “communal land” in former homelands as their personal property, without regard to the rights of the people who have lived on and inherited this land over generations. The judgment is a thundering rebuke to that approach.

My question is, why are these rural people not given title to their homes so that they can raise funds to start their own business, educate their children or invest in a way that will give them financial freedom. Instead they are expected to pay homage to a king and tribal chiefs.

How can such a medieval system still be allowed in a modern Republic?

[adrianh]

Watch the video!

[Blurock]

Watch the video!

Every country has its own problems and history.
In South Africa many farmers were dispossessed due to the scorched earth policy of the English occupiers who burnt down farms and put women and children (including their black workers) in concentration camps where a great percentage of them died from malnutrition and illness.

We can dwell on the past and hate the English for colonialism and its atrocities, but it will make no difference to how we live today. Better to live today and address today's problems to create a better tomorrow.

[adrianh]

How we feel about the past does not change the past - The outcomes and knock on effects of the past exist today and project into the future (education is a case in point). One cannot simply ignore the past because it is inconvenient - the only way to create a better future is to consider the effect the past had on the present and try to compensate for it in the future.

An analogy is evolution. The way evolution works is it builds on top of what already exists by slowly adding / subtracting or altering the existing blueprint that developed over time. Evolution can't just go: Well I feel bad about giving a spider eight legs so I'm just going to ignore the eight legs and give the spider fins. Evolution can only work with what it has created up to that point and slowly develop (for bettor or worse) given its past and present.

South Africans suffer from a sort of past delusion - some want to ignore it and forget it, some want to live in it in the present and some feel that it is their right to take whatever they want in the present because of it....but whatever way people deal with the past they can't ignore it nor wish it away. The only way to deal with is to take the emotion out of it and deal with the facts, when one does that the injustice is obvious.

[Blurock]

Agreed, we cannot ignore the past and we should all learn from those mistakes.
History has shown us just how cruel, but also how kind people can be.
Colonialism was wrong, slavery was wrong, apartheid was wrong, genocide is wrong, discrimination is wrong. We can add so many crimes against humanity.
Yes there may still be consequences of those atrocities, but to pull down statues of slave traders, past kings or rename streets is not going to solve today's problems.
That kind of blame mongering only have negative results.

The poor will always be with us and we can safely predict that 50 years from now, 50% of South Africans will still be poor.
So what are we going to do about it, feel guilty for what our forebears did in the past?
No, we are going to address todays problems today and find solutions for today's problems.
Stop blaming other people for our situation, get up and do something to improve your and your neighbours' lot.

Some people share knowledge and some make donations to charities or pass on old clothes or other unwanted items.
My view is; If you share your leftovers with someone, you have given nothing, but if you share your last plate of food with someone, you gave some of yourself.

[adrianh]

So what are we going to do about it, feel guilty for what our forebears did in the past?

Take emotion out of the equation - solve the problems that stem from what our forebears did.

To quote what I had said earlier: "How we feel about the past does not change the past - The outcomes and knock on effects of the past exist today and project into the future (education is a case in point). One cannot simply ignore the past because it is inconvenient - the only way to create a better future is to consider the effect the past had on the present and try to compensate for it in the future."

[ians]

You cannot help people who cant help themselves ... rather focus on people who want to improve their situation in life regardless of the past.

Dont create another problem because of the past.

There were 1600 electricians who had no placements back in 1987/8 ... why because the government create employment and skills.

Until people understand that civil servants ... are just that ... not kings and queens you cant live in a 10 million house in an elite estate ... drive a 5 million rand vehicle and have monthly ! million rand security details ... if the people you "serve" dont even have a job.

IT seems the military have been deployed ... heavy artillery on the freeways ... not just water cannons ... real cannons ... it seems someone is concerned about others digging in his honey pot.

People should be held accountable for their district they serve.

[Derlyn]

My view is; If you share your leftovers with someone, you have given nothing, but if you share your last plate of food with someone, you gave some of yourself.

Blurock, truer words have never been spoken.

A friend of mine has a very well known bakery.
He donates to about 3 charities on a daily basis in the greater Alberton area.
I have witnessed him, early each morning, choosing the BEST and FRESHEST bread and bread rolls to donate. The slightly burn't or cracked bread and rolls are sold in the shop.

His lesson to me.

When you give, give the best you have, otherwise it does not come from the right place.

Peace out ... Derek.

[Blurock]

Adrian, not emotion, but pragmatism. I fail to understand how my guilt complex is going to assist my fellow man, other than creating more negative feelings.

With reference to our education system. Why should I feel guilty because the Ain’t No Consequences government has done just about nothing to improve the school system since they came to power in 1994? I intended to drop out of school after std 8 (now grade 10), as I was bored as hell and totally lost interest. School in my days was also not great, but at least there was discipline and they taught us the right values.

Minister Mthethwa claimed that our Olympic squad was not representative of the demographics of the country. So who is to blame?
We have approximately 30,000 schools in the country, 7,000 secondary and 23,000 primary.
How many of our schools offer sport at all? Maybe +/- 7000 schools offer sport on a structured basis, against that background will our representation and medal count ever really improve? The different sporting codes hold clinics and training courses, but govt does nothing! Where does the budget go?

If the future is education, creating a well educated workforce must start at Grade 1; the 50% drop out rate between grade one and matric must be resolved; the pathetic numeracy and literacy results must be dramatically improved; the 30% pass rate abandoned; Principals and teachers that deliver unacceptable results disciplined; and the power of SADTU curtailed.

The Minister and Dept. of Education should be evaluated as above and held accountable, not a previous government or something that happened more than 27 years ago! Why should I feel guilty because they are feeding themselves at the cost of our children?

[adrianh]

You should not feel guilty. Emotion is not relevant. There is a problem to solve and one has to look at it objectively without the hindrance of emotion. The problem spans over many years and the solution will also span over many years.

The education issue is also more complicated. It is said that education begins in the home. Our kids grew up with educated parents teaching them in the home. We used to play word games, number games and lots more with our kids, as our parents did with us. When I didn't understand math I could go to my dad or my neighbor and they could teach me. The general level of education of the parents was quite good when we grew up. Black people growing up in this country didn't have that luxury, their parents got no education nor did their grand parents. They couldn't learn in the home because the home was geared to survival and hatred for the oppressors. So, suddenly you have thousands upon thousands of people entering the formal education system without a general in home or social education framework. Those hordes of people have to enter and exit the system within a fair time frame. How do you do that? If you leave the standards high then 90% of kids will fail and remain in the system until they are 90. If you lower the pass rate then a large proportion of kids pass through the system with some education. The ones who want to better themselves will do so through supplementary and tertiary education. The aim is to increase the level of education over time (that includes parents)

The education system is exactly the same as the analogy I gave earlier about evolution of the spider. You can't send white kids to good schools for 3 generations whist sending black kids to crap schools (or no schools) for 3 generations and then one day want to wave a magic wand and have everybody on the same high level especially when the black kids with the poor education represent 80% of society. If evolution want's the spider to have fins then it is going to have to deal with the fact that it had developed legs over a long period - those legs have to evolve into fins over time. Likewise - if we are going to improve education then we have to recognize that the vast majority of people in this country never received formal education until recently.

Look, I am all for better education for all - the problem remains that you cannot put the bar at a point that is unattainable for the masses right now. We have to raise the bar slowly....that is the way to success.

Let me tell you a bit about the experience that my daughters had with "the high bar" and figure skating. Both my daughter were provincial figure skaters. In figure skating they have levels called Skills 1-5. To compete internationalyl they had to have Skills-5. My girls and many other girls in Cape Town did the test and failed - over and over and over again. Some went to Johannesburg and passed the test with flying colors. We fought with the Cape Town Judges over this many many times and they eventually said that they do not want to lower the bar on Skills-5 because if they did then the girls would go make fools of themselves overseas. We felt that it would be great for the girls to go overseas and represent the country even if they came dead last - who cares - they would have had a great experience and they would have learned from their international peers. When it became apparent that the girls would miss the only opportunity of their lives to represent their country in a sport - due to the Cape Town judges blocking their path all the girls that were failed over and over again left the sport. In one fell swoop 10 girls just said "F*ckit we quit" The Cape Town clowns subsequently set the bar the same as Johannesburg but it was too late - the damage was done - They tried to get the girls back but they had had enough. So look, if you make it so difficult that people can't pass then they will quit. When young people see older kids quit they tend to quit earlier because the bar just seems so out of reach.

[Blurock]

If you leave the standards high then 90% of kids will fail and remain in the system until they are 90. If you lower the pass rate then a large proportion of kids pass through the system with some education. The ones who want to better themselves will do so through supplementary and tertiary education. The aim is to increase the level of education over time (that includes parents)

The first thing that the Ain't No Consequences party did was to get rid of teacher's colleges. How can you teach without education? Since 1994 the pass rate and standards in govt schools have been lowered to such an extent that some matric students are almost illiterate. Standards are dropped to ensure high matric pass rates every year.

This may make teachers look good but is devastating for students wanting to go to tertiary education with a 30% pass rate. The reason for the high drop out rate at university and wasted funding. Employers are thus reluctant to employ the unemployable youth and would rather look for someone with experience.

This must be devastating to a young person who have wasted his time at school with a rubbish education. I know a maths teacher who has offered a bursary to the top 2 students in his class. They declined as they reckoned that they would not be able to get a job anyhow.

If standards are kept at an acceptable level, the ones that pass can get ahead and the ones that don't can be assisted with additional classes. Maybe we should concentrate more on technical abilities and not so much on academics. In Europe some countries split the curriculum after a certain level to allow kids the choice between academics and tech.

I don't have all the answers, but it is time to develop a coherent Education and Training Plan for RSA that can actually add value to our economic growth. The unemployed youth could gainfully be used in fast tracking the upskilling of our labour force and so doing drive the recovery of our economy. Let’s get back to basics and start educating the unemployed in our country…rather than dishing out the tax payers money without any reward.