Hon Speaker, the Black Authorities Act Repeal Bill correctly states that the Act was a legislative cornerstone of apartheid engineering, which sought to control communities of black people. It laid the foundation for the establishment of statutory tribal, regional and territorial authorities to administer the affairs of black people.
During apartheid millions of people were forcibly removed into separate tribes, each with their own homeland. Time and again Bantustan consolidation removals favoured compliant traditional leaders, who were then rewarded with large tracts of land, and punished those who resisted by putting them under the authority of the collaborators.
Albert Luthuli wrote in his book Let My People Go:
The modes of government proposed are a caricature. They are neither democratic nor African. The Act makes our chiefs, quite straightforwardly and simply, into puppets and agents of the big dictator. They are answerable to him only, never to their people.
The DA welcomes the repeal of this Bill. But it is concerned by the distorted legacy of the Bantu Authorities Act. This Act will live on. It is in fact entrenched by other recent laws, the basis of which is the Traditional Leadership and Governance Framework Act. The framework Act and the new provincial laws now entrench the contested boundaries and make it virtually impossible for groups who were put under the wrong tribal authority during apartheid to fix the problem.
The new laws enable traditional leaders to have extensive powers within these jurisdictional boundaries. This power is not based on the key customary principle of voluntary affiliation and consensus. Instead, it is based on the apartheid precedent of the top-down statutory power within these fixed geographical boundaries.
These challenges could best be described by the stories related by rural communities during the public participation process. Representatives from Cala University gave the description of a case of two bulls in the same kraal: Although South Africa has moved from an undemocratic era into a democracy in 1994, the lives of citizens living in communal areas has not changed much, unlike their counterparts in urban areas who are governed by means of elected municipal and ward councillors. Communal areas of South Africa have a complicated arrangement in that both municipal structures and traditional institutions have a say in rural areas.
The Ilizwe Lamafa Farmers' Union said:
If a person wants land, they have to go to the chief and request that from the chief. If he wishes, he will give you land and if he does not wish so, he will not give you land. The human rights for men, children and women were and are still deprived and violated by these chieftaincies. If you are summoned by the chief and you fail to appear before him, the chief can take away your residential rights or force you to work in his mealie fields for a period. This means that rural people are subjects and not full citizens.
In most of these cases heard, the plight was not for the removal of the traditional leaders, but rather a serious concern by rural communities to fight for the protection of their cultures.
In conclusion, the Black Authorities Act created these tribal authorities. It disregarded individuals, families and clans living in the same area and having particular rights over the same land. Parliament must ensure that much-needed consultation takes place with affected communities and that consultation is not limited to the chiefs. The DA supports the Bill. [Applause.]