Not a Racist Country? Read the ANC Government’s Own Farm Adverts

White South Africans may not apply to lease a state farm. The rule is written into every advert that the Department of Land Reform and Rural Development publishes. It has been there for years. Lex Libertas raised the rule in a statement on 18 October 2026. That was 6 days after President Cyril Ramaphosa promised about 2.5 million hectares of state land to black farmers in his weekly letter of 12 October.

The think tank pointed to 2 adverts, in Mpumalanga and the Western Cape. However, the department’s own website shows the scale. It lists 216 farm adverts going back to 2023. Every one of them carries the same race line, word for word. Maroela Media reported the statement on 19 October. By 20 October the department had not answered it.

What the adverts say

Take the advert for Portion 3 of the farm Weltevreden 336 JT, in Mpumalanga. The farm covers 493 hectares. It has macadamias, citrus, timber and grazing on it. The department wants a tenant with a turnover of between R1 million and R10 million a year. Then come the eligibility criteria, and the first one reads as follows.

“Applicants must be Africans, Indians, and Coloureds, who are South African citizens. The African in this context includes persons from the first nations of South Africa.”

Department of Land Reform and Rural Development, lease advert for Portion 3 of the farm Weltevreden 336 JT, 2026

Only after that does the advert ask about farming. It wants an ID, a farming area and proof of capital and equipment. It adds that 3 to 5 years of farming experience will be an added advantage. In other words, experience is an advantage and race is the condition. The advert closed on 5 June 2026.

The second advert that Lex Libertas named is the Middelputs project in the Western Cape. It covers 6 257 hectares of livestock land and closed on 13 April. A third advert is for the Kruisfontein dairy farms in KwaZulu-Natal. That one covers 2 254 hectares and closed on 1 July. All 3 carry the same first line.

216 adverts, 1 line

The 2 adverts are not exceptions. On 20 October I downloaded every advert linked on the page where the department lists every advert. There are 216 in all, and 74 of them are from 2026. Every farm advert carries the race line. The only files without it are withdrawal notices and the application guide.

Nor did the adverts follow the President’s letter. The newest is for the farm Syferfontein in the North West. It is dated 7 October 2026, 5 days before the letter, and it closes on 6 November. Another 13 adverts are open until dates between 28 October and 18 November. So the adverts came first, and the letter followed them.

Where the wording comes from

The adverts cite the department’s Beneficiary Selection and Land Allocation Policy. The draft of that policy was published for comment in the Government Gazette on 3 January 2020. It never uses the word white either. Instead it defines a previously disadvantaged South African citizen as a Black person, in brackets Africans, Coloureds and Indians. That person must be 18 years or older and hold a valid identity document.

So a South African born in 2008 counts as previously disadvantaged. That is 14 years after the first democratic election. A white farmer born in 1960 does not count. The wording has also narrowed since 2020. Back then, the 2020 advert for 700 000 hectares still listed South African Chinese among the eligible groups. The adverts from 2023 onwards leave them out.

The department’s website describes its mandate as equitable access to land. It also speaks of correcting the historical injustices of land dispossession. Newsday reported on 18 October that the department confirms white citizens may not lease state land. Briefly News said the same. In both reports, however, the confirmation is the website’s own wording. Neither quotes a spokesperson.

What the President promised

In his weekly letter of 12 October, Ramaphosa wrote that the government is releasing approximately 2.5 million hectares of state-owned land to black farmers. He added that it is providing them with title deeds. He said the country still has what has been called two agricultures. In his words, white-owned commercial farms produce the bulk of the output. Black farmers, he said, account for around 10%.

That land is the land in the adverts. The state has bought farms since 2006 under its Proactive Land Acquisition Strategy. It leases them to tenants chosen by the race line. A title deed makes the same choice permanent.

Not a racist country?

The same government says there is no racism in its laws. In February 2025, Elon Musk asked the President on X why South Africa has openly racist ownership laws. The Mail & Guardian reported that Ramaphosa phoned him. Afterwards, his spokesperson said the President had told Musk emphatically that South Africa does not have racist ownership laws.

A month later, on 24 March 2025, Ramaphosa used his weekly letter to answer claims from the United States. The Associated Press reported his words.

“We should challenge the completely false narrative that our country is a place in which people of a certain race or culture are being targeted for persecution.”

President Cyril Ramaphosa, weekly letter, 24 March 2025

On 15 September 2026 the United States announced visa restrictions. They target officials responsible for laws or policies that enable race-based discrimination against minority groups in South Africa. Al Jazeera reported the answer from Ronald Lamola, the Minister of International Relations and Cooperation. He called the US position the result of mischaracterisations promoted by fringe groups. Then, 12 days later, he told France 24 that the US programme admitting white South Africans is a race-based policy.

Ramaphosa wrote in his weekly letter of 28 September that there is no moral equivalence between redress and discrimination. He also wrote that there is no equivalence between measures designed to overcome racial exclusion and the apartheid laws.

Parliament wants evidence under oath

Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on International Relations and Cooperation joined in on the morning the Maroela Media report appeared. The Citizen reported on 20 October that the committee disputed that black economic empowerment amounts to race-based discrimination. Its chairperson is Supra Mahumapelo of the ANC. The committee said Lex Libertas should present its evidence on transformation legislation under oath, in public and subject to questioning.

“That is the appropriate forum for evidence and counter-evidence, not a foreign legislature.”

Supra Mahumapelo, chairperson, Portfolio Committee on International Relations and Cooperation, 20 October 2026

Ernst Roets wrote on X the same morning that Parliament had responded to the group’s open letter to Lamola. He said the committee challenged Lex Libertas to appear before Parliament and be questioned. He added that the group would respond as soon as possible.

What Lex Libertas said

Dr Ernst Roets, the executive director of Lex Libertas, issued the group’s statement on 18 October. He said the adverts are the state’s own documents. Nobody, he said, had to interpret or leak them.

“When the state holds millions of hectares of farmland and decides by skin colour who may farm it, that is not an isolated mistake. It fits a pattern of laws and policies that single out minorities, and it strengthens the argument that minority persecution is taking place in South Africa.”

Dr Ernst Roets, executive director, Lex Libertas, 18 October 2026

The group is preparing a report on the policy. It also said it would ask the Minister of Land Reform and Rural Development, Mzwanele Nyhontso of the PAC, for a meeting on 19 October. If that did not work, it said, it would continue its local and international campaigns. By 20 October I could not find a reply from the minister, the department or the Presidency.

My view

Is this a country with racist laws? Yes. Judge a government by what it writes down. This one owns millions of hectares of farmland, and it decides by skin colour who may apply for every one of them. It never writes the word white, because it does not have to. It names the other 3.

Apartheid also decided by race who could farm which land. The President says there is no equivalence, and the department says redress. But the advert does not know the difference. Before it asks a single question about farming, it asks your race. I covered the US visa restrictions in the Fringe Groups video. This story is the document that list was written for, and the state published it.

If a detail in this story is wrong

I tell these stories from the public record. I am not a journalist, and I cannot place your story on the record. So if you believe a detail is wrong, contact the outlet that published it. Only the media can correct the public record. You can still send me the full story through my website.

Sources

• Department of Land Reform and Rural Development, ‘Application to Lease State Farms’ (all adverts), read 20 October 2026: dlrrd.gov.za
• DLRRD lease adverts, 2026: Portion 3 of the farm Weltevreden 336 JT (PDF); Middelputs PLAS project (PDF); Kruisfontein farms (PDF); Syferfontein farm, dated 7 October 2026 (PDF)
• DLRRD, ‘Advert to Lease State Agricultural Land’, 2020 (529 014 ha of the 700 000 ha release): PDF
• Government Gazette 42939, 3 January 2020, draft National Policy on Beneficiary Selection and Land Allocation: gov.za
• Maroela Media, Heléne Mocke, ‘Wit boere uitgesluit van staatsgrond’, 19 October 2026: maroelamedia.co.za
• PoliticsWeb, Lex Libertas (Dr Ernst Roets), ‘SA’s race-based farmland leases strengthen the case of minority persecution’, 18 October 2026: politicsweb.co.za
• Newsday, ‘No whites allowed: Government department’s rules for leasing state land’, 18 October 2026: newsday.co.za
• Briefly News, Tebogo Mokwena, ‘State Land Leasing in SA Closed to White Citizens, Department Confirms’, 18 October 2026: briefly.co.za
• SAnews, ‘President Ramaphosa calls for transformation of agricultural sector’, 12 October 2026: sanews.gov.za; the full letter as carried by Food For Mzansi, 14 October 2026: foodformzansi.co.za
• SAnews, ‘President urges South Africans to be guided by constitutional values’, 28 September 2026: sanews.gov.za
• Mail & Guardian, Emsie Ferreira, ‘Presidency: Ramaphosa corrected Musk’s misconception of SA’, 5 February 2025: mg.co.za
• AP (Gerald Imray), via Yahoo News, ‘South Africa president says persecution of whites a false narrative’, 24 March 2025: yahoo.com
• Al Jazeera, ‘South Africa slams planned US visa curbs over alleged racial discrimination’, 16 September 2026: aljazeera.com
• France 24, Tête à tête, ‘Trump granting asylum to Afrikaners is race-based policy, South African FM claims’, 28 September 2026: france24.com
• The Citizen, Faizel Patel, ‘Committee hits back at Lex Libertas, Parliament won’t be intimidated or silenced’, 20 October 2026: citizen.co.za
• Ernst Roets (@ErnstRoets) on X, 20 October 2026: x.com
• DLRRD, Ministry page (Minister Mzwanele Nyhontso): dlrrd.gov.za
• The Riaan Roux Show, earlier video: Who Are Ramaphosa’s Fringe Groups? Why was Bozell Démarched Again?
• Photos: Cyril Ramaphosa, The White House / Wikimedia Commons (public domain). Ronald Lamola, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0). Ernst Roets, AfriForum Marene / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0). Mzwanele Nyhontso, dlrrd.gov.za. Screenshots of the adverts, the gazette, the reports and the X post are used for news reporting and commentary.