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A farm manager in South Africa has been hospitalized after he was attacked and thrown into fire on Saturday.

Local news outlets reported that the manager works on a farm owned by the Mathulini Communal Property Association in Mtwalume, KwaZulu-Natal.

In a statement on Sunday, IFP MP Inkosi Bhekizizwe Luthuli said the “perpetrators of this violent and unlawful act invaded the farm, set it alight and threw him into a fire with the intention of killing him”.

Luthuli also revealed that those who carried out the attack are part of a ‘concerned group’ attempting to take over a 7500 hectare of land from the Mathulini Communal Property Association and the Ndelo Community Trust, valued in excess of $21 million (R300m).

“This violent hijack of a legitimate land claim is a desperate and unlawful attempt to achieve what has failed through legal processes” said Luthuli.

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The farms that are at the center of this dispute produce 400,000 tons of sugar cane yearly, with a staff complement of 1,200 people.

A Police spokesperson Captain Nqobile Gwala who confirmed the news was quoted by News24 as saying that the 24-year-old man was attacked by four suspects.

He said the suspects “pushed him into the fire”. The victim has sustained burn wounds and now under medical treatment at a hospital.

Police are now investigating the case hoping to charge offenders with a case of assault with the intent to cause grievous bodily harm.

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Ownership of land has become controversial in South Africa with the government already in the process of rolling out a major land reform.

The intention of the land reform is to return lands to original black South Africans.

Source: Africafeeds.com