FARMS managed by South African Fruit Exporters (SAFE) have been singled out by Democratic Alliance (DA) MP Athol Trollip for allegedly being involved in corruption related to land reform deals in the Eastern Cape and the Western Cape that have cost millions of rand.
Speaking at a media briefing in Parliament on Thursday, Mr Trollip accused SAFE of being connected to African National Congress (ANC) personalities and taking advantage of the land reform process to manage farms at virtually no expense to itself.
Mr Trollip singled out the Kangela citrus farm project — a collection of nine farms in the Eastern Cape — as an example.
These farms were bought by the Eastern Cape agricultural department in 2004 for R15.68m for a 49% stake. Mr Trollip said that the full price of the farms was for an effective half-stake.
He said the Eastern Cape agricultural finance corporation Uvimba had received the transfer of the R15.68m from that province’s agriculture department, which was in contravention of tender procedures and before the property had been valued.
Mr Trollip said that a recent visit to the Kangela farms six weeks ago revealed that the 44 beneficiaries of the trust that had been set up were unaware of their rights. He also claimed they were being paid R85 a day, which is R20 less than the sectoral determination for the agricultural sector that should pay R105 a day. That was set down at the end of February.
The Kangela farms are managed by SAFE, which operates a packing operation on one of the farms and exports fruit. "What we noticed through our intelligence is that when the farm workers’ strike broke out in the Western Cape, several names kept cropping up," he said.
Mr Trollip said that the farm workers’ strike broke out on a farm called Keurboschkloof after it was taken over by SAFE, which reduced the minimum wage paid.
Most of those workers were members of the Congress of South African Trade Unions-aligned Food and Allied Workers’ Union.
The strike, which spread throughout the table-grape export area, started last September and only ended in February.
On Wednesday, Democratic Alliance MP Annette Steyn accused Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Joemat-Pettersson of fuelling the strike by funding another union, the Bawsi Agricultural Workers’ Union, to the tune of R14m.
Ms Joemat-Pettersson defended this, saying she would continue to fund organisations that aim to improve the lives of farm workers.
Mr Trollip said he would raise the issue of the Kangela farms in Friday’s rural development and land reform budget vote debate.
SAFE CEO Anton de Vries did not respond to a request for comment.
According to the SAFE website, the company is registered in Mauritius, has its head office in Cape Town, and owns 29 farms in South Africa.
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