In his maiden State of the Nation address (Sona), President Cyril Ramaphosa pledged that land expropriation without compensation, which government regards as one of several measures to accelerate land redistribution, will be undertaken “in a way that promotes agricultural production, improves food security, advances rural development, reduces poverty and strengthens our economy”.

Let us ponder this. Land expropriation refers to all land, and is not confined to the popular narrative, which holds that land expropriation is exclusively about farm land. Expropriation has been identified as ‘one of the measures’ that government will take to speed up land redistribution, but we have not been told what the other measures are and how many there will be. Could the imposition of yet another tax be one such measure? Or is government perhaps considering legislation limiting property ownership or that it be instated as the sole custodian of all land in the country in the same way that it abolished landowners’ mineral rights?

It appears that the distribution of land will be implemented on racial lines. Does this imply that tribal land will not be considered for distribution? What about ‘white’ South Africans who were deprived of their land by previous governments? What about ‘white’ South Africans who do not currently hold any title to land? Are they to be excluded from the redistribution of land merely because of their ethnicity? Is land redistribution envisaged to be a rudimentary racial endeavour?

As for the economics, just exactly how will land expropriation promote agricultural production, improve food security, advance rural development, reduce poverty and strengthen the South African economy?

Is it assumed that present agricultural production is not as productive as it should be and that the redistribution of expropriated land will result in more productive farming? Will the redistribution result in the division of farms or the introduction of multiple ‘farmers’?

With respect to food security – this, by definition, is the state of having reliable access to a sufficient quantity of afford- able, nutritious food. It is unclear how this is going to be achieved by means of land expropriation and redistribution – unless the assumption is that present agricultural production is not unproductive enough.

Then there is the assertion that land expropriation will advance the social imperatives of rural development and poverty reduction. Is the assumption that there will be no monetary compensation for the owners of the expropriated land, that the owners obtained the land without having to take out debt and that, if they did obtain debt, this will be inherited by – or transferred to – the new owner? Another apparent assumption is that the new owners will have access to funds to manage the farm and to compensate their workers. The goal to decrease poverty can only mean two things – that wages increase and that more workers are employed. It goes without saying that both of these will increases the cost of agricultural production.

Land expropriation is envisaged to strengthen the economy. For the South African agricultural sector to strengthen the economy, it needs to do two things: increase production and increase productivity.

Confusingly, the President stated: “No one is saying that land must be taken away from our people. Rather, it is how we can make sure that our people have equitable access to land and security of tenure.” At contention is exactly what is defined as ‘our people’, since expropriation means “the action of dispossessing someone of property”. So, is it a case of ‘our’ dispossessing ‘them’? Surely, this is not the language of a President who represents the dreams, hopes and desires of all South Africa’s citizens. Rather, it is indicative of a party leader.

The President spoke of equitable access; ‘equitable’ is defined as ‘fair and impartial’. If the criterion for land expropriation is that the beneficiaries must only be black South Africans, then this is simply irrecon- cilable, even self-contradictory. This will be quite an achievement, as Charles Hodge reminds us: “There is a great difference between the irreconcilable and the self-contradictory.”