‘Give Us What You Promised' – Black Farmer To Government

Land reform in South Africa has, by and large, been labelled a failure. After 26 years and billions of rand spent on farms and inputs, successes are still few and far between. Solly Letsoalo, a farmer in Limpopo, spoke to Lindi Botha about his experiences over a 13-year period as a land reform beneficiary.

- Lindi Botha

“Government has betrayed black farmers by promising them funds, recapitalisation, and committing to pay money, which they do not do. They have created hope and then taken it away,” says Solly Letsoalo, a Proactive Land Acquisition Strategy (PLAS) programme farmer from Limpopo, relating his experience as a black farmer waiting for government to fulfil its promises of funding.

Letsoalo has been part of the PLAS programme since 2007. Since then, he has spent more time filling out countless forms than farming. Besides recapitalisation money that has been outstanding for four years, he is also awaiting funding that was promised as part of the COVID-19 relief funds for smallholder farmers.

“This whole issue about government funding for black farmers has damaged relationships and broken trust between white and black farmers. They say we get R1,2 billion COVID-19 relief funds and all the other money that government is always committing to black farmers and do nothing with it. But what the public does not know is that what government commits to us never reaches us.”

Despite this, says Letsoalo, government doesn’t always necessarily fail from a lack of trying. He says that for the most part, there seems to be an effort being made to do things correctly, but implementation is fraught with problems and corruption.

GOING NOWHERE

Letsoalo started farming in 2007 on a farm near Tzaneen under a lease agreement provided through the PLAS programme. Since the property was rather dilapidated and government funding to do the repairs was delayed, he used his savings to renovate the farmhouse to make it liveable for his family.