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A significant victory was secured for a family in the Barrydale area in the Western Cape after they successfully opposed their eviction. On 5 August 2025, the Land Court in Cape Town handed down judgment dismissing an appeal by a landowner who sought to overturn the decision of the Swellendam Magistrate’s Court which dismissed their application for an eviction against the occupiers.
The eviction was sought against a family comprising two main occupiers (husband and wife), their daughter who has a physical disability and two minor children. The wife was born on the farm while the husband started staying at the farm in 1989. With the exception of the husband, all other parties were born on the farm.
The married couple previously worked at the farm. The wife had to resign in 1998 to take care of their daughter who was living with physical disability and the husband stopped working in 2020 as his employment was terminated.
The landowner’s contention was that since the husband was no longer employed at the farm, the family’s occupation must be terminated. The Extension of Security of Tenure Act allows landowners to terminate occupation of farm occupiers when they no longer work at the farm, provided employment was the sole reason for the farm occupier to live on the farm in the first place.
However, even in such instances, the landowner is required to not only rely on the absence of employment to terminate the residence of occupiers but must also consider all relevant factors such as conduct between themselves and the occupiers, the hardships each party will suffer in the instance of termination or lack thereof, the period of occupation, especially if there would be a reasonable expectation of extending the occupation, and agreements between the parties.
Before the termination is done, the farm occupier is generally given an opportunity to explain their circumstances in relation to their occupation and circumstances after termination. Both the Magistrate’s Court and Land Court found that the landowner had not complied with the requirements above that justify termination.
The Land Court dismissed the appeal by the landowner without making any order as to costs.
From the Magistrate’s Court to the Land Court, the occupiers were represented by Legal Aid SA’s lawyers Mvuyisi Mjuda, Lelethu Mgedezi and Hilary Julius from the Stellenbosch Local Office. The Legal Aid SA Northern Cape/Western Cape Provincial Executive Nolitha Jali stated that this matter is one of many similar cases in the province where vulnerable occupiers such as women, people with disabilities and children face eviction despite having occupied farms for many years and having nowhere else to go.
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