NEW HILTON COLLEGE LAND CLAIM

Hilton College, South Africa’s most expensive private school, is subject to a land claim. A community is claiming that it was forcefully removed from the site located in KwaZulu-Natal more than 100 years ago.

The property is a 1,695ha area with its own 650ha of nature reserve. The property also borders the Umgeni River in the picturesque Midlands region.

This isn’t the first time that the school has been subject to a land claim. In 2005, a land claim lodged by Inkosie Sikholwa Zuma in 1998 was set aside by the land court. Back then, Zuma was the leader of the Nxamalala tribe of which former president Jacob Zuma hails.

The court found the eventual conclusion absurd, insisting that the claim by the clan wasn’t based on tribal jurisdiction but racial removals.

“An irrational decision is the decision which is shockingly bad and defies logic to the extent that no sensible person who had applied his/her mind correctly to the question to be decided could have arrived at that decision.”

Business Day reports that South Africa is still grappling with its polarizing land dispossession past. Since its inception and up to September 2022, the commission has settled more than 82,000 claims equating to 3.8-million hectares.

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