These are the words of General Garnet Wolseley, the Governor of Natal, requesting the Boundary Committee to transmit them to the thirteen Zulu Chiefs who had been selected and appointed by the British after King Cetshwayo's exile on 31 August 1879.
Although the British had previously been successful in excising Zulu lands, through the 1846 Land Boundary Committee and the 1864 establishment of the Natal Native Trust, the social and cultural formation of Zulu communities had remained largely undisturbed, and linked to direct, harmonious relations with the land. The region's abundant physical and natural environment nurtured practices through which each homestead was materially self-sufficient and dependent entirely on the products of their labour for food, basic materials, and the instruments of production.
However, King Cetshwayo's exile ushered in a new era of conquest. All Zulu lands were placed under the administration of the Natal Native Trust, new traditional leadership structures were imposed, and capitalist production intensified, which together dislocated and reconfigured the historic social formations.
The promulgation of the Ingonyama Trust Act (the Act) in 1994 and subsequent establishment of the Ingonyama Trust Board (ITB) neither challenged nor dismantled the paradigms and practices established by the Native Trust Tenure system/s. The Act re-enacted key elements of the Natal Native Trust (1864) and the Native Trust and Land Act (1936), both established to hold land in trust for traditional communities on behalf of the Queen of England. The Ingonyama Trust Act sought to transfer land vesting in the Queen of England to His Majesty, the Ingonyama (Zulu King), absent of substantive changes to the system the Native Trust had established.
Although the land is held in Trust for the material benefit and social well-being of the members of the traditional communities, and while the Act protects the land rights of beneficiaries by requiring the prior written consent of the traditional authority or the community authority concerned before any pledging, leasing, alienation, or disposal of any of the land or real right in the land, the practice is different.
The ITB adopted a Disbursement Policy in 2015, according to which 75% of the revenue generated by the Ingonyama Trust should be reserved for the traditional community from which the investment/funds come. Ten percent is allocated to the traditional leader of that community, 10% is allocated to the administrative purposes of the ITB, and the remaining 5% is reserved for the trustee to serve communities without sufficient resources. The ITB, however, has historically presided over systemic violations of the policy and the real land rights of beneficiaries, while drawing on the Ingonyama Trust to fund the personal needs of the Royal Household. This practice derails its mandate of benefiting the traditional communities.
In June 2021, in the case of CASAC and Others v Ingonyama Trust and Others, the Pietermaritzburg High Court found sufficient evidence to establish that the ITB and the Ingonyama Trust acted unlawfully and in violation of the Constitution by replacing real land rights (permission to occupy certificates) with residential leases. The Court also found a dereliction of statutory and constitutional duties by the Minister and/or the MEC, which seriously prejudiced the customary law rights and land interests of the traditional communities.
Recent reports on the Ingonyama Trust have restated the continued violation of land rights. In March 2025, the ITB's Chief Executive Officer, Mr Vela Mngwengwe, detailed a culture of financial misuse, corruption, theft, opportunism, and greed as deeply entrenched in the historical management of ITB affairs. Misinterpretations of the Ingonyama Trust Act have reportedly become enculturated in ITB processes. The Minister of Land Reform has also recently met with the Ingonyama, out of which a commitment to establish a team of twelve leaders to stabilise the Ingonyama Trust was announced.
The publicised battles for control of the ITB present an opportunity to reconsider the role and relevance of trust tenure systems in the context of its origins in colonial conquer.
While the practices and challenges of the Ingonyama Trust and ITB may more prominently expose the ramifications of continued reliance, by the post-1994 state, on colonial and apartheid-derived land tenure systems, the Ingonyama Trust exists within a larger scheme of trust tenure imposed on traditional communities across South Africa. For the traditional communities across the approximately 13% of South African communal lands previously vested under the South African Native Trust as Homelands/Bantustans, the national government is the Trustee, and similar land tenure practices prevail.
At least three main considerations should inform sustainable solutions to the Ingonyama Trust and the ITB challenges.
Firstly, Security of Tenure: Continued violations of the customary land rights of traditional communities perpetuate and reinforce a culture of conquest. A land titling system must be developed to address insecure land tenure for traditional communities and to heal the wounds of historic land dispossession and alienation. Within this framework, the ITB could maintain a register of land holdings by individuals and/or households to promote and guarantee secure individual and communal tenure. The relevance of trust tenure for the present socio-political age must be considered.
Secondly, Climate In/Justice: KwaZulu Natal has more recently experienced the harsher effects of Climate Change. Flooding incidents occur more frequently, with devastating impacts on rural and traditional communities. In April 2022, 443 people reportedly lost their lives, while another 48 are unaccounted for. Over 26000 homes, 600 schools, and 84 health facilities were damaged.
King Misuzulu kaZwelithini has requested that the Province host an urgent Climate Change Summit. The traditional communities of KwaZulu Natal, having a history of organic and egalitarian relationships with land, are best placed to lead the development of sustainable solutions to Climate Change, and must lead this Summit.
Lastly, Food In/security: The Human Sciences Research Council recently revealed that KwaZulu-Natal faces significant food insecurity, with 70% of households struggling to secure adequate food, particularly in districts like Zululand, uMkhanyakude, and uMzinyathi. Climate change, the unresolved land reform project, poverty, and lack of infrastructural support are some of the identified underlying causal factors. Food insecurity is an indictment on a region that historically maintained a self-reliant culture through productive relationships with the land.
The ITB must urgently ensure that a substantial portion of the 75% of revenue reserved for traditional communities is invested in promoting cultures of agricultural productivity. Restoring land productivity has the potential to dismantle dependency, promote food sovereignty, and slowly reverse the rapid pace of urban migration.
The effective application of the above three pillars requires an insistent separation of the personal affairs and needs of the Zulu Royal Household from the fiduciary requirements of the Trust.
Contemplating the roles, duties, and relevance of the Ingonyama Trust separately from the personal needs of the Zulu Royal Household encourages objective and more generalizable considerations of the relevance of trust tenure systems for restoring the dignity impugned by sustained land dispossession.
As the more prominent reminder of conquest through trust tenure systems, the Ingonyama Trust is best placed to lead the development of a national land tenure system that revisits the organic, self-sustaining social formations of traditional communities, explores localised and indigenous responses to climate injustices, reverses rapid urban migration, promotes food sovereignty, and effectively heals the wounds of colonial conquest.

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Philile Ntuli is a commissioner of the SA Human Rights Commission. She is responsible for Land Reform, Food Sovereignty, and the National Preventative Mechanism