EXPROPRIATION BILL SIGNED INTO LAW

EXPROPRIATION BILL SIGNED INTO LAW

• 23 January 2025
• New Legislation
• SA Legal Academy

Please note: The Act was gazetted on 24 January 2025 but is not yet in force.

The Presidency has issued a media statement announcing that the Expropriation Bill has been signed into law. This comes ten months after being passed by Parliament.

As has been widely reported, among other things the new piece of legislation provides for the expropriation of land and landed property for nil compensation in specific circumstances, where this is deemed to be in the public interest. Interestingly, however, the statement makes explicit no reference to this. The Bill also provides for the Act’s phased commencement.

More broadly, according to the Presidency, the new piece of legislation provides a common, guiding framework for the expropriation of property by organs of state, along with related processes and procedures. This is noting that, in keeping with constitutional imperatives:

• ‘an expropriating authority may not expropriate property arbitrarily or for a purpose other than a public purpose or in the public interest’
• under the new legislation, expropriation is ‘subject to just and equitable compensation being paid’
• ‘expropriation may not be exercised unless the expropriating authority has without success attempted to reach an agreement with the owner or holder of a right in property for the acquisition thereof on reasonable terms’, and that
• ‘an expropriating authority is therefore obliged to enter into negotiations with the owner of a property required for such purposes’.

At the time of writing, the Act had yet to be gazetted.

• media statement
• Bill’s ‘D’ version (passed by Parliament in March 2024)

Published by SA Legal Academy Policy Watch

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