South Africa's Constitutional Court Upholds Land Expropriation Act With Strict Safeguards

The question of land reform has haunted South African constitutional politics since 1994. The constitution's property clause — Section 25 — was always understood to permit expropriation without compensation in defined circumstances; what lacked, until the Expropriation Act of 2024, was the statutory framework to operationalise that permission. What lacked, until the Constitutional Court's judgment, was certainty that the framework would survive legal challenge.

The Act identifies five categories of land in which nil compensation may be awarded: land held purely for speculative purposes with no active use; land abandoned by its owner; land where the state's historical role in subsidising acquisition is significant; land held by a state-owned entity not needed for its functions; and land acquired through illegal means. For all other expropriations, just and equitable compensation — assessed against a multi-factor test including current use, history of acquisition, and the public interest — remains the standard.

The Constitutional Court, in an 8 to 3 judgment, holds that the nil-compensation categories are precisely enough defined to survive the Section 25 property rights protection, provided that courts apply rigorous procedural review to each individual expropriation. The majority emphasised that the Act does not permit administrative expropriation without judicial oversight — every nil-compensation determination must be confirmed by a court on application.

Commercial farming organisations, who brought the challenge, welcomed the judicial oversight requirement while expressing concern that the speculative holding category is broad enough to capture productive agricultural land held in corporate structures. The government has committed to publishing regulatory guidelines within six months addressing the definition's application to farming operations.

"The constitution was always capable of this," said Chief Justice Raymond Zondo. "The question was always whether we had the framework to do it carefully. Now we must be careful."