It was reported that land claims were cumbersome and complicated and that Safcol had tried to unclog the bottlenecks through a project to facilitate the process. It was fraught with difficulties as communities fought against each other as the process neared the settlement stage while land rights were vested in various government departments. The DPE informed the Committee that Safcol was assisting where it could, and that the DPE was constrained financially to settle land claims and that this impacted negatively on Safcol. Communities revolted if their claims were not satisfactorily resolved. Furthermore, communities were unhappy with the fires that occurred in plantations.