News on Land

The issue of land, especially its redistribution, remains contentious in South Africa 27 years after the formal end of apartheid. Land redistribution was promised at the end of apartheid. The failure of the African National Congress (ANC) government to do so is emblematic of its failure to fundamentally transform the country.

BOUSSÉ — Terror attacks on gold mining operations in Burkina Faso are becoming a regular occurrence. For VOA, reporter Henry Wilkins looks at the impact the attacks are having on the lives of survivors and what it could mean if extracting gold, the country's primary source of income, becomes too dangerous.

“Boukare,” whose name has been changed to protect his identity, is a survivor of the Yirgou massacre.

The attack by an unknown terror group in June this year targeted a small informal gold mining site, like this one, and killed at least 160 people, mostly mine workers.

Lucky Mabhiza, a journalist for the Mbare Times reports that the Ministry of Mines and Mining Development has cancelled certificates of registration for mining in Uzumba that had been given to a Chinese company, Heijin Mining Company (PVT) LTD.

207 land certificates were  recently handed over to the beneficiaries, men and women, of the Benga and Karunga hills of Isare commune, Bujumbura province.

Yesterday for the first time at a UN climate summit, world leaders shone a spotlight on forests and land. Heads of state, corporate moguls and philanthropists lined up to announce huge figures to protect nature and halt and reverse forest loss.

Kim Harrisberg and Megan Rowling writing for the Thompson Reuters Foundation examine how 1.1 million people have been severely impacted  by  persistent drought in  Madagascar and how 14 000 are one the edge of famine.

Tafadzwa Ufumeli writing in African Arguments analyses a conflict of interest between the Dinde Community and Chinese coal mining investments 

(Sao Paulo) – Brazil’s climate commitments and policies fall far short of what is needed to address the environmental and human rights crisis in the Amazon rainforest. Brazil’s delegation arrives in Glasgow for the global summit on climate change with a national climate action plan that is less ambitious than its previous one, and with forest conservation plans that either lack deforestation reduction targets or set them at far less ambitious levels than Brazil’s prior commitments. 

Residents of Monakato, Madikwe and Rustenburg (Tlhabane) staying in houses they received during the former home land of Bophuthatswana were giver guarantee of ownership of what has been their homes for decades and across generations. Over 400 residents were given title deeds during a ceremony held in Monakato Community hall recently.

BULLDOZERS AT THE GATES — Here’s a novel idea: Let’s save the forests. As the U.N. Climate Change Summit in Glasgow, Scotland, gets underway, the first big promise is about deforestation.