Mdluli Safari Lodge

[Lisbeth]

My impression, which might be wrong, is that the community has no idea of what is going on and most of them might not even know that they are owners of a piece of land and that they are being cheated by a handful of their own people, who handle with only the personal gain in mind

In one way or another, the community must have given the approval for these people to represent them

[Richprins]

All sorts of "rightful representatives" appear when big money is involved, IMO!

[Klipspringer]

All these media reports and documents are a bit confusing.

The Facts:

1. The Mdluli community own communal land outside the Numbi gate and there is a lodge ownwd by the trust.
2. They own land "inside the Kruger Park", which is the socalled farm Daannel, the community was forced off the 850ha property in 1969 and the Kruger National Park took over its administration (IMO, one could also say, they stole the land). This is where the new lodge is situated (close to Pretoriuskop camp).
3. Various development projects have been proposed there, but no lodge was built due to the problem to find investors happy with the restrictions set up by SANParks to operate a tourism venue there.
4. The new lodge here is the outcome of a 20 year process of the community struggling to gain some income from their property.
5. SANParks commercialization strategy and the interests of the community clashed because of the option to do game drives from there into surrounding Kruger.

It's quite an interesting piece of history. A good overview here (Spenceley, Anna. (2003). Tourism, Local Livelihoods, and the Private Sector in South Africa: Case Studies on the Growing Role of the Private Sector in Natural Resources Management. )

Case Study 1: Daannel Farm, Mdluli Tribal Authority
The case of the Daannel Farm illustrates some of the difficulties of initiating and progressing tourism where complex political and financial agendas of both the public and private sector may not always facilitate development. It depicts some of the successes and difficulties that a community has encountered in attempts to make economic use of their land. The Mdluli Tribal Authority (TA) was previously discussed in relation to the Phumlani Lodge, which was built on their communal land. This case study looks at their attempts at tourism development on land claimed back from inside Kruger National Park. Description In 1969 a railway line was built from Kaapmuiden to Phalaborwa that ran along the western side Kruger National Park (KNP), to the east of the Mdluli Tribal Authority (See Figure 4, next page). However, the farm Daannel (33 JU), an 845 ha portion of the Mdluli Tribal Authority’s land, lay to the east of the proposed railway line. The park authorities considered that the railway line was generally the most practical and identifiable western boundary for the Park (Anon 1998a), and at this time, South African National Parks (SANParks) requested that Daannel be designated part of the National Park (pers. comm. Gertenbach 2002). SANParks proposed that a larger area of KNP that lay to the west of the railway (and therefore would be cut-off from the rest of KNP) could be de-proclaimed and used by the Mdluli tribe in exchange for Daannel (ibid.). However, the Department of Land Affairs did not gazette the request, and although KNP report that ‘everyone’ agreed to the swap (ibid.), the original negotiations between KNP, the Department of Bantu Affairs and the Department of Transport did not include people of the village of Makoko (within the Mdluli TA) (Kruger National Park 1994a). Despite the lack of formal agreement to the land exchange, the railway was constructed and the Mdluli TA lost access to Daannel, due to the presence of the railway and a fence constructed by KNP along the new park boundary. Subsequently members of the Mdluli TA began to occupy the 2,500 ha area of KNP that had been cut off to the west of the railway, while SANParks began to manage Daannel as part of KNP (pers. comm. Gertenbach 2002).

In 1992, KNP received a letter from the Department of Land Affairs stating that Daannel was to be returned to the Mdluli tribe. Numerous meetings and consultations were held between the parities through the Lubambiswano Forum39 (Marais 1995), and KNP recognised that the loss of access to Daannel had deprived the tribe members of an important natural source for grazing their cattle (Kruger National Park 1994b). KNP stated that although they had administered the land for 30 years, ‘all parties’ had always recognised that Daannel was state land, and that it fell within the jurisdiction of the Mdluli TA. The Minister of Land Affairs gave permission for the ownership of Daannel to be transferred from the State to the Mdluli Trust, and on 29 June 1994 the board of KNP formally acknowledged that they had no claim to ownership of Daannel (Anon 1998a). On the same date as KNP’s acknowledgement, Chief Mdluli wrote to KNP’s Executive Director regarding Daannel to request that, ‘… the control and supervision … be placed under [KNP’s] conservation staff … [and be] performed in terms of the National Park Act, as applicable to the Kruger National Park’ (Mdluli 1994)

Community benefits and losses Tourism development: Despite a series of attempts to do so over the past 8 years, the Mdluli TA has not yet been able to develop tourism on Daannel. Since 1994 a number of private sector constortia have engaged with the Mdluli TA and have put forward proposals to develop commercial tourist accommodation enterprises on the Daannel farm that would benefit the community. In each case the Mdluli Trust was to act as lessor of the property to the consortium for a period of 99 years, and was to hold equity of 10% in the development company concerned (Anon 1998b). In the case of one proposal for a 120 bed Hilton Hotel, members of the Mdluli tribe were also due to benefit from placement within 50% of the proposed 132 jobs that would be created (Introprops 41 {Pty} Ltd 1997). They were offered first option on business opportunities such as the provision of fresh produce, laundry services, entertainment, maintenance contracts and curios (African Eye News Service 1998a). However, the proposals were eventually dropped due to KNP’s refusal to allow game drive vehicles from the hotel to traverse the wider KNP. The Director of KNP stated that game drives could only take place on the Daannel, but that such activities in the wider KNP could not be considered at the time due to the ongoing commercialisation process in KNP. All potential operators were being asked to tender for the right to run concessions in the park with traversing rights attached (Mabunda 2000). With allocations only to traverse the 845 ha area of Daannel, investment for the initiative could not be found, and the proposals went on hold. Another obstacle arose over the size of the proposed developments: the third proposal in 1998 was for a 60-bed hotel and two 20-tented lodges, but both KNP and the Mpumalanga Parks Board considered that a 40-bed development was the largest development that Daannel could support (Freitag and Macgregor 1998). Opposition to the development from KNP was on environmental grounds and in relation to the business feasibility of the development (Freitag and Macgregor 1998). In the case of tourism development, the community has not made losses or benefits in relation to socio-economic development or their livelihoods. However, considerable time, effort and expectations for the tourism potential have so far come to nothing.

Driving forces and constraints It appears that the Chief MZ Mdluli and the community have been fully involved in the range of attempts to exploit the commercial and natural resource potential of the tribe’s reinstated land. Chief MZ Mdluli was reported as saying that he did not want to fence the area off from KNP, but wished to allow animals to roam freely. He said, ‘For over 100 years the land has been devoted to wildlife and nature and our community can benefit from the commercial activities of ecotourism and environmental conservation’ (cited in African Eye News Service 1998a). The participation by the rest of the tribe is illustrated in the course of the establishment of the Mdluli Trust. This only took place after a series of community meetings were held during 1997. They included (Acer 1998): • Meetings held in the four villages within the Tribal Authority of Makoko, Bhekiswako, Nyongane and Salubindza during May; • A public meeting in June where representatives of the four villages, House of Traditional Leaders, the Lowveld Escarpment District Council, Department of Land Affairs, Kruger National Park, Mpumalanga Department for Environmental Affairs and Tourism, and the developer Team Development Concepts; • A public meeting held in December, which 362 members of the Mdluli tribe attended. At this meeting the community discussed the potential to establish the Trust in order that the community could lease the Daannel farm to a private sector development company for 99 years. It was proposed that the Mdluli Trust would hold 10% of the development company’s shares, and that the receipts from the Trust and the company would be used to benefit the Mdluli tribe and the community. Although the Chief appeared to work closely with the private sector in preparing applications for the various developments, it appears that the community has had little influence in pushing its proposals forward to fruition.40 It is possible that the community may have been persuaded, incorrectly, by private sector developers that a hotel development was the most viable and profitable land use option for Daannel. Alternative economic options for commercial land use that were put forward by KNP for the farm, such as breeding rare species (pers. comm. Gertenbach 2002) were not pursued. It would be interesting to know if a scenario had arisen where a private sector driver had been found to push forward the rare-species breeding option, rather than the hotel development, whether it would have succeeded – for both commercial reasons and because it was a suggestion from KNP. This case study demonstrates several constraints that prevent the community from realising the commercial value of their land, particularly the different objectives and procedures of the stakeholders involved. KNP is focused on its environmental procedures and internal commercialisation process. For example, in a letter from KNP to the TA regarding a contractual park application, it was noted that the application process depended upon the successful compliance with each stage of the development process, which could not be short-circuited or hurried. It was also presumed that the community and their private sector developers were becoming frustrated since they were ‘… concentrating on the business opportunities rather than only the conservation considerations of a national park’ (Mabunda 2000: 2). KNP has facilitated economic benefit to the TA by harvesting thatching grass, employed local labourers, and has also facilitated the installation of water pumping equipment from the Nsikazi river for cattle. However, SANParks wider commercialisation policy has confounded a series of plans for the community to develop tourism on the land. The private sector involvement in various hotel proposals has not been fruitful in this case. The private sector Trustee of the Mdluli Trust, Piers Bunting, stated that the hotel proposals were on hold since international hotel groups are not currently interested in investing in South Africa. Instead they prefer to enter projects without investment risk, where they simply hold an operating contract for a tourism enterprise. He noted that this is in part due to a volatile currency and a current lack of domestic spending on tourism (pers. comm. Bunting 2002). Thus the restoration of their land inside Kruger to the Mdluli Community has apparently opened up commercial options for Mdluli tribe, but given the bureaucratic and political context, it has not yet led to any significant tangible benefits.

[Klipspringer]

To set record strait: This property is "Non-SANParks land within the boundaries of the KNP"


from 2008 KNP management plan

2.1.3.2. Non-SANParks land within the boundaries of the KNP
These are areas that have been successfully claimed by communities and fall within the boundaries of
the KNP. The areas are under individual community ownership. These areas came about as a result
of land restitution and/or community areas that were fenced in but not necessarily proclaimed as part
of the KNP historically. Currently there are three such areas in the KNP, namely Makuleke Contractual
Park (land claim), Mdluli land and Nkambeni land (communal land fenced into the KNP). The day-today conservation management of these areas, which includes law enforcement and biodiversity
management and monitoring, is performed jointly by KNP officials and the respective communities.
Commercial activities within these areas have been contracted out by the communities as
concessions and the concession-holders are responsible for commercial developments. A signed
settlement agreement exists in the case of the Makuleke land, but no agreements exist with the Mdluli
and Nkambeni communities.

[Lisbeth]

What a mess

Doesn't SANParks always sustain the communities close to the border of the park? At least that is what they declare

[Klipspringer]

I think very little come along for the poor part of the community.

And when tourism developments rely on a Community Trust, there is a clear potential for elite capture.


And looking at the history of this project it's obvious that there is a lack of power and a sense of exploitation within large party od the community and hence lots of suspicions and frustration at how the lodge has developed.

[Lisbeth]

With the poor mostly goes also ignorance and thus the facility of fooling them and the lack of ethics in the world of the profiteers

[Richprins]

So the tribe now have control of two areas of absolutely prime land, where historically they only had one!

[Klipspringer]

Opening October 2019, operated by Tourvest Accommodation and Activities

(says the website)

[Lisbeth]

Still to be seen