Freedom Front Plus (FF Plus) leader Pieter Groenewald says businesses may be afraid to invest in South Africa because of the proposal to expropriate land without compensation. He was speaking to SABC News in an exclusive interview on the party’s manifesto unveiled last weekend ahead of the November 1 Local Government Elections.

Groenewald says the country has enough land and that the land question is being used as a political playball.

The Ad hoc Committee on Section 25 of the Constitution recently adopted a Bill to allow expropriation without compensation.

Both the Democratic Alliance and the FF Plus opposed the Bill.

He says, “Land is not the problem that we do not develop the economy. South Africa has more than enough land, land is not the issue. Because of expropriation without compensation then you get businesses that say I will not come and invest in South Africa because I’m not sure about my assets.”

“I say it’s a political playball to use land and make it the scapegoat for everything that goes wrong. There’s enough land. Let’s be fair, the land is there. You go and look at the annual reports on land reform. They got the land from the owners, they bought it, they gave it to black people, they wanted to farm and it is admitted in the annual report. Ninety-percent of those projects failed,” he adds.

VIDEO: Groenewald on the party’s manifesto and election campaign:

BEE

Groenewald says the party is against black economic empowerment and affirmative action.

He says the policy disadvantages young white people who were not part of the apartheid era.

FF+ launches its 2021 Municipal Elections manifesto: