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116 Choosing Cash over Land in Kalk Bay and Knysna The Time Factor in Urban Land Claims Anna B ohlin Acommon scenario in restitution cases around South Africa has been that early on in the process significant numbers of land claimants wish to have land restored to them.1 As time passes, however, this number decreases, and by the time the claim reaches the settlement stage, only a small core group of individuals, if any, still opt for land, whereas most choose cash compensation. Given that a key goal of the restitution program has been to promote desegregation and transfer land to previously disadvantaged groups, a pertinent question is: What is it about the passage of time that has led so many land claimants to change their minds and opt for financial compensation? This chapter addresses this issue through an analysis of two restitution cases in the Western Cape: Kalk Bay, a fishing community and suburb of Cape Town (see map 3), and Knysna, a town on the Garden Route.2 Both involve urban claims in attractive coastal areas where the demand for and value of property is high. Apart from all other forms of value—social, cultural , and emotional—the houses and plots that were lost represent significant economic assets: one house under claim in Kalk Bay was sold in 1995 for close to R500,000 (about US$70,000) and would be worth much more today. Furthermore, in both cases there were possibilities for land Choosing Cash over Land in Kalk Bay and Knysna 117 restoration or alternative land. Thus compared to cases where the land under claim is either unavailable or economically unattractive, these cases offer compelling economic arguments why claimants would pursue the option of land restoration—which, initially, many claimants did. The chapter begins with an outline of the history of displacement and land claims in each place and then analyzes how claimants’ preferences changed as circumstances shifted. An exhaustive analysis of claimants’ reasons for choosing financial compensation—including economic, psychological , and social reasons—is beyond the scope of the chapter; it focuses, rather, on some dimensions of temporality that are relevant for understanding the dynamics involved in claimants’ change of mind. Claiming Land in Knysna When around a thousand individuals in Knysna lodged a land claim with the Commission on Restitution of Land Rights (CRLR) satellite office in the town of George in 1996, the initial idea was that land would be restored to them. The claim had come about after public meetings in Knysna arranged by the Southern Cape Land Committee (SCLC), a local nongovernmental organization that was informing the public in the region about the recently introduced land restitution program. Although the claim was initially submitted as a community claim, in actual fact it involved individual households from all over Knysna,3 for neighborhoods where the application of the Group Areas Act and other policies had resulted in racially motivated forced relocation from the 1950s through the 1980s: Salt River, Welbedacht, Vlenters, Wit Lokasie, Ouplaas, and Hunter’s Home, to mention a few. Although each place had its own character in terms of demography and tenancy arrangements, there were some commonalities around tenure before removals. More than 70 percent of the people classified as “coloured” in Knysna, in total some 750 families, lived in the areas of Ouplaas (Heidevallei ) and Eastford (later known as Salt River) (CRLR 1999). They leased plots that varied from 0.4 to 3.3 hectares from white farmers and the Anglican Church. Some fifty white and twenty African families were also listed as living in these two areas. Most of the tenants had built their own homes, the majority out of wood and zinc. About 10 percent lived in brick houses. Most had well-established gardens where they grew vegetables, and many kept livestock on communal grazing areas. Both areas were affected by proclamations in terms of the Group Areas Act in 1966, and from 1969 118 Anna Bohlin to 1978 tenants classified as “coloured” were relocated to Hornlee, an area east of town with electricity and water, and those classified as black to plots without such basic services around Knysna. The church-owned ground of Salt River was sold to Knysna municipality and subsequently subdivided and sold to white buyers (CRLR 1999). Most houses were demolished or abandoned, but some of the brick houses still remain. The Heidevallei land, situated next to the N2 highway, was bought and is still owned by the municipality. Although part...

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