By Bongani Mthethwa
A bitter land battle between a sugar baron and a local community is threatening to torpedo an upmarket resort on KwaZulu- Natal's North Coast.
The Dube community of 782 families this past week rejected a R20-million offer by SA Sugar Association chairman Roger Stewart and the éLan Group - the developers of the billion-rand Blythedale Coastal Resort - to buy them off the land.
The resort, which will see the construction of more than 4,000 homes, a hotel and a golf course is located on a 1,000ha sugar estate owned by Stewart, who has sold it to the developers for an undisclosed price.
Dube community representative Musa Dube accused Stewart of being the stumbling block by rejecting their claim as invalid "while at the same trying to coax us to a settlement".
The land became disputed after the Dube community lodged a claim in 1998 with the Land Claim Commission, arguing that they had been forcibly removed to make way for sugar cane farmers. Prior to their uprooting, they claim to have lived on the land for generations. Most of them ended up in Enkukhwini, in KwaDukuza.
The claim was declared valid by the land claims commission.
Stewart and the éLan Group offered the Dube community a R20-million settlement for all the land they sought to claim (100 00ha), proposing it be paid for as follows:
- R6-million on transfer of the land from New Guelderland Sugar Estate (Pty) Ltd to Blythedale Coastal Resort (Pty) Ltd;
- Five successive instalments of R2-million, each payable on the anniversary of the transfer; and
- R4-million towards the purchase of a sugar cane farm, with Stewart mentoring and assisting in its management. But if the farm was not purchased, the R4-million would be payable in cash.
They would also receive 100 start-up houses in the resort.
But the community has rejected the offer, saying it would prefer its land back before any development takes place.
Stewart, who is disputing the validity of the claim, said he was not aware that the community had rejected the offer. He refused to comment further on the matter.
"I don't discuss my negotiations with the press," he said.
Dube said the R20-million offer to the community was "peanuts" compared with what the developers would gain out of the project.
The newly installed chief of the Dube tribe, Khulekani Dube, said his community wanted to become part of the development but only after their ancestral land had been restored. "It now seems as if our claim to our ancestral land is being usurped by developers," he said.
The éLan Group has already launched the project in Cape Town, Johannesburg and London and it has made more than R1-billion in sales.
Mark Taylor, chief executive of the éLan Group, said in a statement last week that the current offer was a revised one based on the community's proposals , and they understood it to be acceptable to them. "The revised offer has now been put to the community and the land claims commissioner and we hope that it'll be signed shortly since it's based entirely on what the community proposed."
Simphiwe Mxakaza, spokesman for the regional land claims commission, said they were aware of the offer but had rejected it because Stewart and the developers had not followed the proper procedures.
He said Stewart had originally not allowed the commission to determine the market-related value of the land - before making the offer. He has since agreed to allow the commission to conduct a valuation of the land. "We're expecting the valuation report to be ready in the next couple of weeks so we can continue to process the claim," said Mxakaza.
Sunday Times
Publisher: I-Net Bridge
Source: I-Net Bridge
