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Johannesburg - More than 500 Bhisho families are to split
R42m paid by government under the land claims programme after losing their
ancestral plots during apartheid, the Dispatch Online reported on Thursday.
The money would be deposited into the claimants' bank
accounts next week - 14 years after two communities lodged claims with the
national department of rural development and land reform.
The R42m was owed to 368 families in Tyutyu village and 153
families in Balasi village.
Rural Development and Land Reform Minister Gugile Nkwinti
was making headway in settling all claims across South Africa in the next few
years, his spokesperson Mtobeli Mxotwa was quoted as saying.
The Tyutyu village claimants were forcibly removed after the
now-defunct Ciskei homeland became independent in 1981. They lost their
residential homes and grazing land.
Some Tyutyu families would receive R95 303 in compensation
for properties they lost, while others would get R56 377, totalling a R26m
payout.
Just across Maitland Road in Bhisho, the Balasi village families would be paid R16.3m. They were removed to make way for the construction of the then-Ciskei capital shortly after 1981.
