The charges against Ehrenreich are attempts to intimidate him into silence and will be largely ignored. The Transvaal Agricultural Union (TAU) can go and lay 10 more charges if they think it will help their cause to defend apartheid practices on farms. In Ehrenreich’s view TAU is as irrelevant as Agri SA and farmers need a new organisation to represent them in the negotiations, for the future of agriculture.

The land question will be solved this year, and so will there be an end to apartheid-style practices on farms. We will not allow bad farmers to continue their reign of terror on farms. We will work with good farmers and build an agricultural sector that is aligned to the values of the new South Africa.

COSATU repeats its call to Agricultural farmers to stop intimidating farm workers and to stop dismissing and evicting the workers. We call on Government to take the farm land away from bad farmers who are evicting workers, and to give farmers minimal compensation for the land. The farmland must then be given to good farmers and good workers to develop in the interest of our country. This development should be done in a manner that builds a real partnership between farm workers and good farmers. These bad farmers whose attitudes to workers are informed by racism should then also be encouraged to leave SA, as their values are not aligned to the new SA.

This year a new deal on farms will be finalised, with good farmers, that will see support to the good farmers, but bad farmers will get nothing. We will see land reform, decent conditions, comprehensive Agricultural development strategy, and support from Government to the farmers, and greater market access for SA products to overseas markets.