Imithetho Yomhlaba yaseMsinga

(The Land Laws of Msinga)

What are we finding out?

Outline

• The Mchunu ‘model’• Variations and actual practice vs the

idealized model• Contrasts between Ncunjane and

Mathintha, two adjoining areas• Traditional Council – establishment,

composition, uncertainties• Emerging issues and problems• Lessons for the project

Mchunu ‘tribe’: the basic model

• Who qualifies for rights?• What rights do women have?• What is the nature of the rights to land and natural

resources?– Security, inheritance, borrowing, sales, restrictions on use, in

relation to: – Residential land - a site for a homestead (umuzi)– Arable land for crop production (imisimo) (but not always

available due to scarcity)– Common property resources ((grazing, trees, grass etc)

• How are boundaries demarcated?• What are the land administration procedures? (eg

allocation, records, fees/levies, dispute resolution)

Who qualifies for land rights

• Members of the tribe and their descendants• Married people with children to support• Widows retain access to land (unless they

remarry) but sons will inherit• Outsiders (who apply for tribal membership by

asking for land)

NB: strong emphasis on the family and the ‘surname’, ie the patrilineage

Nature of rights: residential site

• Where family members live, build houses, kraal their livestock, cultivate gardens

• Adult children or siblings can build houses• Strong and secure rights, whether or not

recorded in tribal office• Eldest son inherits, but widow remains and

controls until she dies (unless she remarries)

• Top structures can be sold, not the land

Land administration

• Layered system of social & political organisation:

homestead> neighbours> subward> ward> tribe (umuzi>umhlati> isigodi> isizwe)

• Different authority figures at these levels: umnumzane> ibandla> nduna> inkosi

• Most processes (eg land allocation, dispute resolution) occur locally, with neighbours, the ibandla and the nduna approving allocations, deciding on boundaries, hearing disputes etc

• Chief and TA/Trad Council not involved in day to day land admin; but inkosi does approve outsiders coming in

Variations: practice vs ideals

• Unmarried women with sons beginning to be allocated land

• Some women feel unmarried women with daughters should also be allocated land

• Some abandoned women/divorcees who return to the family are being allocated land

• Brothers and their wives (sisters-in-law) co-operating closely in agriculture, lobolo payments etc – to ensure survival of the surname

• In land-scarce izigodi, borrowing of fields more common• Some of these are clearly adaptations to ongoing

processes of social change

Contrasts between Ncunjane and Mathintha

• Ncunjane: isigodi on ex-labour tenant farms, being returned via land reform

• Resource abundant and less populated• Unhappy about Mathintha people using their grazing and

tree resources• Some self-allocation of land without oversight by nduna;

processes under way to address this• Relationships with neighbours-to-be on adjacent land

reform farms (also within Ncunjane) not yet clarified• Not represented on new Traditional Council• No khonza fees paid to Nkosi

Traditional Council

• Established late 2006, operative in 2007, early days, feeling their way

• 18 nominated by nkosi (8 women), 12 elected (4 women)• Not all female members related to Mchunu royal family;

some clearly active in community affairs• Women councillors would like to raise issues of land

rights for single women, not yet done so• Elections apparently run by IEC, but not in reality (Trad

Affairs)• Some candidates bused in their own voters • Inadequate funding of Tribal Office and TC an issue

Issues and problems

• Decline of clear controls on resource use eg tree cutting• Bundles of green wood (amabonda) cut by newly

married women• Increase in numbers of unmarried women with children

needing land• Differences between land laws and institutional

arrangements on land reform farms and rest of Mchunu • Disappearance of families due to AIDS – and

abandonment of homesteads• Unresolved boundary disputes (eg Mchunu vs Mthembu

tribes) could cause problems for CLRA

Lessons for the project

• Distinguish carefully between normative ideals and practice

• Look for local variation and adaptive practice• Triangulate for consistency and to discover the

discrepancies and differences• Lots of fluidity at present (TLGFA, CLRA)• Evidence of both:

– resilience of underlying value systems and tried-and-tested structures (eg the multi-generational homestead)

– major shifts (decline in marriage) and shocks (AIDS)