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Chapter 6 The Greytown area - KwaZulu-Natal
KwaZulu-Natal Midlands area
The Greytown district
The Greytown district1 is situated within the jurisdiction of the Umvoti commando, but it is necessary to distinguish the Greytown district from the rest of the commando’s jurisdiction. The rural protection plan in the Greytown district is highly organised and extremely sophisticated. In the remainder of the jurisdiction, participation in the rural protection plan is sporadic. This state of affairs appears to reflect the state of the rural protection plan in the Midlands in general: pockets of excellence are surrounded by large stretches of poor and sporadic organisation. In the case of the Umvoti commando, the unevenness in the strength of the plan is partly explained by the fact that two Greytown farmers have gone to great lengths to develop and sustain the plan, and have creatively used the resources of the SANDF at every point. Relationships with senior SANDF personnel have been close and productive. The farming community has been highly responsive to initiatives, probably as a result of a series of acute problems faced by the district over the past few years.
The town of Greytown itself is at the epicentre of the Greytown farming district. It is surrounded by a ring of approximately 200 medium and large commercial farms. Timber and sugar are the predominant crops farmed in the area. Both employ a combination of permanent and seasonal labour. Farmers in the area estimate that about half of the farming area’s workforce are permanent and live on the farms themselves. The other half are employed seasonally to cut timber and to plant sugar. Beef, dairy and vegetables are also farmed in the area, but not very extensively. Beef production declined rapidly in the area during the 1990s, largely as a result of widespread stock theft.
Surrounding the ring of 200 commercial farms is a far larger ring of ‘traditional land’. Constituted by 37 chieftaincies and inhabited by more than half a million people, the area is densely populated and poverty-stricken. While cattle remains both a symbol of wealth and an indispensable component of marriage, land in the traditional areas is severely overgrazed and increasingly unsustainable. Due to extremely fluid population movements, levels of unemployment in the area are almost impossible to gauge. Anecdotal evidence, however, suggests that the area is inhabited by thousands of unemployed young people, and that the authority of the elderly over the young is increasingly strained.
Given its severe poverty and the scarcity of opportunities, few residents of Greytown’s traditional land live their entire lives in the district. The vast majority migrate to Durban and Johannesburg. Some return to the district seasonally, others intermittently during the course of their lives. According to the police area command, the population of the district expands by as much as 30% over Christmas and Easter, as migrant workers return home for the holidays.
The tradition of migrancy in the Greytown district alleviates some, but not all of the district’s economic woes. While migrant remittances do bring much-needed cash into the traditional areas, many migrants still get married in the district and require cattle to do so. The centrality of cattle in the area’s traditional culture and economy, in the context of dwindling sustainable land, has created acute land hunger and is partly responsible for growing land encroachment. Land hunger, the breakdown of the authority of elders over the young, and the widespread practice of migrancy form a critical backdrop to understanding farm attacks in the Greytown district.
Land encroachment
Many farmers in the Umvoti area insist that land encroachment is the single biggest cause of farm attacks. As is argued below, there is reason to be sceptical of this claim. Nonetheless, the question of land encroachment deserves careful attention.
The Greytown farming district is surrounded on all sides by a massive expanse of traditional land. The problem of land encroachment from traditional areas to commercial farms is confined to the northern boundary of the Greytown district. Some security personnel claim that this is because farms in the north are far larger than those on the southern, eastern and western boundaries, and thus far more difficult for farmers to police. Others argue that the problem is concentrated in the north because traditional authority there is particularly weak. Security personnel say that, by late 1999, seven farms in the Greytown district had been affected by land encroachment.
Encroachment began in 1994 and, according to farmers and security personnel, has occurred in two distinct ways:
- Land claims are lodged against a farm, or portions of it. The farmer then agrees to sell his farm to the department of land affairs. Once word gets out that the farmer is leaving, his land is invaded by cattle and goats from the neighbouring traditional area, as well as by informal dwellings. Land affairs is invariably slow to close the deal. Two or three years down the line, the farmer begins to doubt whether the deal is still on. He wants to recommence using the land that has been invaded and clashes with those who have settled there.
- No land claim is lodged. Instead, those on the borders of a farm begin a quiet and subtle process of encroachment. The invaders mark out a portion of the farm. Seeds planted there are uprooted. Cattle that graze there are killed. The farmer retreats from that section of his land, only to find that the encroachment process follows suit.
At least one murder of a farmer in the area appears to be directly related to a land dispute. In October 1998, Mr Redinger, a prominent farmer in the Kranskop area, which is located on the north-western boundary of the Greytown farming district, was shot and killed in his vehicle by three young men on a public road about one kilometre from his farm gate. In 1997, a chief whose jurisdiction covers the land adjacent to the western boundary of Mr Redinger’s farm, lodged a title deed claim to a portion of Mr Redinger’s land. In response to the claim, Mr Redinger agreed in principle to donate a portion of his land to community development and entered into a dialogue with the chief and with community and state structures with the intention of building a school on the allocated land.
During the process, a group of young men who lived in the area and became community representatives in the dialogue, demonstrated repeated hostility both towards Mr Redinger and the initiative itself. In the months before his death, Mr Redinger’s life was threatened on several occasions by young men from the area. In October 1998, a group of three young men stopped Mr Redinger’s bakkie as he was returning home. Recognising them, Mr Redinger got out of his vehicle to talk to them. He was shot at point-blank range with a shotgun and his vehicle was stolen. Three days later, the Greytown murder and robbery unit arrested two of the three culprits. They were found guilty of murder in the local regional court. Both served on the local community police forum with Mr Redinger, knew him well and had been peripherally involved in the dialogue about the fate of his land.
The reasons behind the murder remain a source of debate in the local community and among the security forces. Same say it was a simple hijacking. Others insist that the killing was directly related to the ongoing debate about the future of Mr Redinger’s land.
The context of the murder is both sobering and instructive regarding the capabilities of the rural protection plan. It is deeply ironic that Mr Redinger was killed in the very process of ‘getting things right’: responding to land hunger by giving up land in an impeccably consultative process. The young men who killed Mr Redinger were neither aspirant farmers, nor community representatives in any real sense. They appeared to be animated by a wild and disturbing political identity, one only obliquely connected to the hunger for land, and one which could not be contained, even by an inclusive and sophisticated consultative process.
At this point, it is worth describing the history of the relationship between the rural protection plan and traditional leadership in the Greytown area. As short a time ago as 1996, there was barely a relationship between them at all. The traditional areas north of Greytown are inhabited by highly militarised and well-armed communities. Both the conflict between African National Congress and Inkatha Freedom Party-aligned communities in the late 1980s and early 1990s, as well as longstanding conflicts between rival chieftaincies, have left a legacy of organised violence. Until 1997, the traditional areas north of Greytown were de facto no-go zones for the security forces. In 1996, plainclothes police officials were attacked in the traditional areas on two separate occasions. In 1997, members of the police’s illegal firearms unit were ambushed by a group of over a hundred men, many armed with automatic weapons. A one-and-a-half hour gun battle ensued. The police officials were eventually airlifted out of the area by an SANDF helicopter.
In 1998, the various component institutions of the rural protection plan began to develop relationships with the area’s traditional leadership. The army and police consult with local chiefs before entering the area in search of illegal firearms. The KwaZulu-Natal Agricultural Union (Kwanalu) meets once a month with the Greytown district’s traditional leadership to discuss land and security matters.
Security personnel report that every chief in the area has pledged to act against the illegal encroachment of land by his subjects. Many farmers, as well as senior security personnel, however, believe that while the involvement of chiefs in the rural protection plan is crucial, such involvement has its limitations, and this for two reasons:
- The social fabric of community life in the jurisdictions of many traditional leaders is frail. The authority of traditional structures over young people, in particular, is weak.
- Many traditional leaders are deeply suspicious of the rural protection plan and regard it as an encroachment upon their rightful authority. The relationship between traditional leaders and the rural protection plan is often cautious and distrustful.
Farmers, as well as army and police leaders expressed a great deal of anger at the manner in which the department of land affairs has conducted the land claims process. Word gets out that land is to be redistributed, raising expectations in the area, but land affairs is invariably painfully slow to act on land that has been earmarked both for title deed and tenant claims and for purchase by land affairs itself. The result is that the fate of large tracts of land remains interminably suspended, raising tensions and creating the space for unlawful occupation, farmers and security personnel claim.2
Farmers and security personnel say they have no principled objection to land distribution. They insist only that it occurs in a manner that is both sustainable and lucrative. If redistributed land is overpopulated and overgrazed, the problem of land hunger is delayed, rather than solved. However, as a land affairs official pointed out, those who encroach on commercial farm land are seldom those who intend to put it to commercial use. Growing pressures of dire poverty, the erosion of the authority of political structures and the increasing aggression of unemployed youths makes the politics of land encroachment an extremely difficult process to manage or contain.
As important as land encroachment is, a detailed study of the area’s murder and robbery dockets illustrates that issues of land ownership and occupation are directly responsible for only a small minority of farm attacks and should not dominate thinking about the rural protection plan.
Case studies
Axe attack and vehicle theft
In August 1999, a farmer in the Rietvlei district, about 35 kilometres south of Greytown, was building cottages on his farm. He drove through his farm gates to drop a group of labourers off at the building site, leaving his gate open as he was due to return to the gate a few minutes later. When he returned to the gate, two men dragged him out of his bakkie, assaulted him with an axe and fled in his bakkie. Two days later, members of the Greytown murder and robbery unit arrested two men in Sweetwaters, a settlement on the periphery of Pietermaritzburg. One of the two knew the farm on which the attack took place well. An aunt of his had worked on the farm for many years, and the suspect often visited the farm for extended periods.
The suspects in this case were youths from the area and rank amateurs at armed robbery. (The axe was borrowed from an aunt of one of the suspects.) It appears unlikely that the suspects had sustained access to the region’s illicit economy. They appear not to have been contracted to commit the crime. A reading of the files of the Greytown murder and robbery unit, and discussions with its personnel, indicate that about 30% of farm attacks in the area fit this category: local, amateur perpetrators, working alone.
The farm on which the attack occurred, was not part of a local security cell and the rural protection plan’s rapid reaction capacity was thus not available.
Murder and theft of firearm I
In September 1999, a 75-year old farmer in the Weenen district was shot dead while opening the gates of his farm in the middle of the afternoon. The suspects took his revolver, but left both his bakkie and a considerable amount of cash that was lying in the glove compartment of his bakkie. A reward for information leading to the conviction of the perpetrators was advertised. Following up information received from members of the public, the Greytown murder and robbery unit arrested three men six weeks after the murder. All were between 20 and 24 years old. All lived on traditional land on the outskirts of the Weenen district. None had any direct connection to the farm. However, it appears that the perpetrators had inside information on the farmer’s movements. The farmer had been dipping cattle that day, an activity that required him to return to his farm house during the course of the afternoon, something he seldom does. Investigators surmised that a labourer assisting in the cattle dipping process informed the suspects of the farmer’s movements. Several labourers were interviewed by detectives, but nothing followed from the interviews.
Investigators believe the suspects intended to sell the gun in the Weenen area. They failed to take the bakkie, investigators believe, because they were amateurs and had no idea where they might sell it. It is well-known that there is fierce demand for firearms in the Midlands area. According to investigators, even in the poorest of informal settlements, a 9mm handgun can fetch a price of five or six goats. A stolen firearm is thus a source of formidable wealth — relatively speaking — for some of the destitute who live in informal settlements in the Midlands.
Murder and theft of firearm II
In September 1999, the employee of a prominent Weenen farmer learned that his employer had deposited more than R200 000 in a safe in his farmhouse. The employee recruited five men, none of them from the Weenen district, to plan an armed robbery. Three of the five approached the house early on a Monday morning while the other two stood guard on the public road (the employee himself did not participate in the attack for fear of being recognised). The three approached the farmer’s foreman and asked to buy cattle. At this point, the farmer emerged from his house and reached for his handgun which was holstered on his hip. One of the three suspects shot him at point-blank range, took his firearm and chased after the foreman. The farmer’s domestic worker radioed for help, the local security cell responded and the five fled in different directions.
Ten days later all six suspects had been arrested. Investigators received information that the employee was involved and questioned him. The employee led police to the other five. One of the six was about to board a taxi to Soweto (Johannesburg) when he was arrested. In his home in a peri-urban Midlands settlement, investigators found three rifles and 315 rounds of ammunition. One of the rifles was a police-issue R1 that had been stolen in Kimberley three months previously. The same afternoon, investigators drove the suspect to a room he rented in Soweto. There they found the gun used to kill the farmer, as well as R40 000 in cash.
Greytown murder and robbery detectives say that about 30% of suspects arrested for farm attacks in the Greytown area are arrested in Gauteng. Detectives also say that the figure of the ‘professional entrepreneur’, a full-time criminal well networked in South Africa’s illicit economy, appears in about 30% of cases investigated. Typically, as in the case above, the ‘entrepreneur’ has both local links in the Midlands and to illicit markets in South Africa’s urban centres.
It should be pointed out that the Midlands area is deeply involved in the regional illicit firearm market, primarily as a consumer. Some traditional areas are highly militarised and well-armed, often with automatic weapons. Security personnel believe that most automatic weapons in the area are purchased in Gauteng. Whether there is a connection between farm attacks and the illegal firearm trade between Gauteng and the Midlands is a matter for further exploration. Some security personnel believe that some of the firearms stolen in farm attacks are destined for the arsenals of warlords in the traditional areas of the Midlands. There is no evidence for this thesis, but it is worth investigating. Whether true or not, it is significant that large and well-oiled illegal markets between the Midlands and Gauteng already exist. It is possible that farm attacks use market links — for vehicles and firearms — that have been in existence for many years.
The rural protection plan in the Greytown district
The structure of the rural protection plan in the district is both innovative and unusual. All security structures and initiatives in the district are linked to a single nerve centre, a control room in the middle of Greytown called the ‘911 centre’. The name of the centre refers to just one of its functions: three 24-hour hotlines have been established at the centre, accessible to the entire telephone network in the district. In addition, the 911 centre is in radio contact with all 200 farms in the district, with specialised police units in the area (murder and robbery, and stock theft), with the Greytown police station, as well as with all other emergency services in the area, and with Army Group 9 headquarters in Pietermaritzburg. The centre has a ten-person reaction force at its disposal, available 24 hours a day, and a 20-person, ten-vehicle proactive unit that patrols both the town and the countryside. Both the reaction and the proactive unit are staffed by a combination of permanent force and commando personnel.
The 200 farms in the district are organised into security zones. Given the principle that all members of a cell should be within less than eight minutes driving time from each other, each zone is divided into roads. Thus, when a distress signal is transmitted on the radio network, road members are instructed to get to the scene, and zone members to staff access points to the district. The 911 centre is notified at the same time, and co-ordinates the response of the reaction unit and the police. The centre also performs a daily radio check with each of the 200 farms in the area, beginning at 7h00.
The Greytown district falls within the jurisdiction of the Umvoti commando which is staffed by 250 civilians. One-third of the commando’s citizen personnel is black and for the most part unemployed. These unemployed men form the backbone of patrol, guarding and reaction activity.
Much of the commando’s work consists of proactive patrols designed to prevent stock theft. A typical stock theft patrol is performed on foot, between 8h00 and 16h00, and covers approximately 20 kilometres of the Greytown countryside. The placement of patrols is driven by information gathered from farmers and is never routine. Commando personnel claim that 1998 stock theft levels were 70% lower than those recorded in 1996.
The 911 centre, supported primarily by SANDF resources and personnel, has all but taken over both proactive policing and rapid reaction in the Greytown area. The centre, in conjunction with local police personnel, has established a wide crime information network in the town of Greytown itself and has deployed its town patrols accordingly. To the extent that it is possible, proactive patrolling in the countryside is also informed by the centre’s intelligence gathering and is performed by SANDF personnel. The one area where the police still play a crucial and largely autonomous role is in investigation.
This situation is very unusual in the Midlands. It appears that farmers in many districts respond to the lack of police capacity by hiring private security firms that offer guarding, patrol and reaction services. There are as many as 40 private security firms operative in the farming districts of the Midlands area. Seldom do farmers respond to the lack of police capacity by pulling their weight behind the rural protection plan over a sustained period, as has happened in the Greytown district. The Greytown approach has obvious advantages over districts that skirt the rural protection plan and opt for private security instead:
- Civilian security cells are better placed to deliver a rapid reaction capacity than professional patrols in sparsely populated farming districts.
- All aspects of crime-fighting — from information gathering to proactive policing to response and investigation — are co-ordinated from a central point. All security personnel are thus driven by a single strategy.
- The 911 centre draws heavily on SANDF resources and is thus less expensive for farmers than private security.
Has the Greytown strategy worked? On the face of it, it appears that it has. Certainly, with regard to housebreaking in town and stock theft in the countryside, crime levels have declined as much as 70% since the 911 centre was put in place. With regard to farm attacks, the evidence is a little more ambiguous. Farm attacks have declined in the Greytown district since the rural protection plan kicked in. In 1996, the year before the 911 centre began its work, the Greytown police district recorded the highest levels of farm attacks in the Midlands police area. In 1997, attacks declined by 20% and in 1998 by 25%.
How much of this decline is attributable to the capacity brought to the district by the rural protection plan? At first glance, it is difficult to say. The arrest rate for farm attacks in the district is high: 74% over the three-year period between 1997 and 1999. However, in only 35% of successes was rapid reaction responsible for the apprehension of suspects. Statistically, this means that the perpetrators of three out of four farm attacks evade the rapid reaction capacity of the rural protection plan. In 65% of cases, investigative work by the Greytown murder and robbery unit was responsible for bringing suspects to book. It is therefore possible that the decline in farm attacks is the result of good detective work, which would exist irrespective of whether the plan was in place. On the other hand, it is possible that the presence of the plan in the district has had a deterrent effect, and that its successes are thus invisible. Indeed, the 911 centre appears to have an extensive information network and conducts regular preventive exercises.
Notes
- The KwaZulu-Natal Midlands constitutes a massive police area inhabited by nearly two million people. The research team elected to concentrate on two areas comprehensively, rather than on several superficially. The districts chosen were Greytown and Ixopo where the rural protection plan is particularly strong. The decision to study two successful districts has both advantages and disadvantages. On the one hand, it masks the fact that the plan is weak in other Midlands districts. On the other hand, choosing two strong districts has the advantage of highlighting best practice.
- Land affairs officials in the area refused requests for interviews, and it was not possible to ascertain first-hand information on the progress of the land claims process.
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