South African farm attacks

The South African farm attacks (Afrikaans: plaasmoorde; "plaas" = farm, "moorde" = murders) are an ongoing trend of violent attacks on farmers in South Africa. Between 1994 and March 2012, there had been 361,015 murders in all of South Africa and between 1990 and March 2012, there had been 1,544 murders on South African farms of which 208 of the victims were black. In January 2015, AfriForum reported that there has been an increase in farm attacks and murders in the previous five years.

A spike in violent attacks on farmers in February 2017 led to one of the country's largest prayer meetings being held on the 22-23 April 2017 in Bloemfontein, attracting over one million participants.

South African statutory law does not define a "farm attack" as a specific crime. Rather, the term is used to refer to a number of different crimes committed against persons specifically on commercial farms or smallholdings.

According to the South African Police Service National Operational Co-co-ordinating Committee:

Attacks on farms and smallholdings refer to acts aimed at the person of residents, workers and visitors to farms and smallholdings, whether with the intent to murder, rape, rob or inflict bodily harm. In addition, all actions aimed at disrupting farming activities as a commercial concern, whether for motives related to ideology, labour disputes, land issues, revenge, grievances, intimidation, should be included.

This definition excludes "social fabric crimes", that is those crimes committed by members of the farming community on one another, such as domestic or workplace violence, and focuses on outsiders entering the farms to commit specific criminal acts. The safety and security Member of the Executive Council (MEC) for Mpumalanga Province, Dina Pule, has disagreed with this definition and has stated that "farm attacks" only included those cases "where farm residents were murdered, and not cases of robberies or attempted murders". Human Rights Watch has criticised the use of the term "farm attacks", which they regard as "suggesting a terrorist or military purpose", which they consider to not be the primary motivation for most farm attacks.

The Natives' Land Act adopted in 1913, awarded the ownership of 87 percent of land to South Africans of European descent. The modern discontent among the black South Africans has caused the populists to call for a confiscation of white-owned farms in the north. The EFF party, founded by Julius Malema, demanded redistribution of the land and wealth.

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