HARARE – The opposition Movement for Democratic Change has rejected a plan by the Zimbabwe government to pay US$3.5 billion in compensation to white farmers whose land was expropriated by the government to resettle black families.

Zimbabwe does not have the money and will issue long term bonds and jointly approach international donors with the farmers to raise funding, according to the compensation agreement.

President Emmerson Mnangagwa hopes the deal signed with farmers’ representatives on July 29 will move the country a step closer to resolving one the most divisive policies of the Robert Mugabe era.

MDC Alliance Vice President Tendai Biti, in comments made during an interview with ZimLive, explains why they have a problem with the compensation deal:

“What essentially has happened is that the government of Zimbabwe through a statement issued on July 29, 2020, announced to Zimbabwe, announced to the world that it is revoking offer letters given to all black farm owners on farms, particularly those farms that were covered by Bilateral Investment Promotion and Protection Agreements (BIPPAs).

This follows very closely after the enactment of Statutory Instrument 62 of 2020, Land Commission (Gazetted Land) (Disposal in Lieu of Compensation) Regulations, 2020, which were followed very closely by the Global Compensation Agreement signed between Emmerson Mnangagwa and white farmers in respect of which US$3.5 billion was committed in respect of compensation for improvements.

We are against these legal instruments. We wish to make it very clear that the basis of the liberation struggle was the issues around the land. We wish to make it very clear that there’s no country in the world that can survive where the ownership patterns of that land are disposed towards minorities.

Professor Amy Chan many years wrote a book ‘The World on Fire’ in which she describes instability that is caused by disequilibrium vis-à-vis majority participation in the economy and minority ownership of that economy.

The land question was resolved by the land reform programme. We differed with the government of the day on the land reform programme because of the methodology of the same – the violence, the lawlessness.

In any event we accused Zanu PF that in 20 years between 1980 and 1999 it had only acquired 3.2 million hectares of land of which 2.2 million hectares was acquired in the first five years when the willing-buyer willing-seller provisions of the Lancaster House constitution applied.

We therefore argued that Zanu PF was never interested in land, and they only started invading land on February 14, 2000, after they had lost in the Constitutional Referendum. In fact ironically the original MDC manifesto spoke of acquiring 8 million hectares of land whilst Zanu PF’s spoke of acquiring 5 million hectares.

Be that as it may, the truth of the matter is that from a supply side point of view, from a liberalisation point of view, from a democratisation point of view, the land reform has resolved the liberation grievance of land and the constitution protects that. The constitution makes the reversal of the land reform programme unconstitutional.

But through the back door, through these insidious instruments – SI 62 of 2020, the Global Compensation Agreement and now this statement – it is so clear that Emmerson Mnangagwa is moving towards a regime of reversing the land reform programme.

In fact SI 62 of 2020, a mere statutory instrument, allows him to take any land and give it to a former white farmer.

We object for five reasons. The first reason is that don’t start a war in this country. Don’t make black farmers who have been on the land for the last 20 years get angry and start a civil insurrection in Zimbabwe.

Two, don’t reverse the gains of the liberation struggle, the only real, lasting legacy of the liberation struggle is the land because it’s tangible. No-one eats the lowering of the Union Jack, but people eat land. The land is tangible, land is substantive, so don’t reverse the gains of the land reform programme.

Thirdly, you cannot breach the constitution of Zimbabwe. Follow the constitution, uphold the constitution. SI 62 of 2020 is against and ultra vires the constitution for the simple and good reason that any disposal of land now has to be done by the Land Commission and not by the Minister of Lands as is proposed in those regulations.

The Global Compensation Agreement is clearly unconstitutional for the constitution makes it very clear that compensation for improvements should only be done in terms of an Act of Parliament that defines how assessment is made, that defines how the money is to be paid out.

Emmerson Mnangagwa is systematic in his abuse of the constitution.

Number 4, this is not the priority right now. The priority right now is to give people title deeds, the priority is to restore the land market, the priority is to make sure that farms are downsized and there is a land audit which eliminates multiple farm ownership. The priority right now is to establish markets for farmers, to provide adequate finance for farmer so that they don’t keep on going to Command Agriculture and other quasi-government means of support.

New farmers can’t continue to be new farmers for 20 years, they must now stand on their own like some of the most outstanding ones are doing like Ray Joseph Kaukonde who is farming fantastically in Mashonaland East.

The priority in the country is to resolve the economic problems, is to resolve the poverty issue – 95 percent of our people are unemployed, 10 million people have to be fed, 79 percent of the people are living below the poverty datum line.

We have four generations, people who are 40 years who have never had employment in their lives. Employment is a major issue, not what they are trying to do.

Lastly, we are against any process that is undemocratic, any process that is opaque, any process or major policy decision in which Zimbabweans are not consulted. Section 141 of the constitution makes it very clear that Zimbabweans must be consulted. In this particular issue, we are so concerned that one is concentrating on white farmers, what about the black farmers who were dispossessed? What about the millions of black people whose land was taken away anyway?

I come from Shawasha in Murehwa, and our land was taken. Where my house is was our original capital, but I had to buy that. So, what about the blacks who were dispossessed by colonialism?

This is a mad, vacuous, renegade regime that doesn’t have ideas, that is corrupt. They are also doing this thing in the hope that they will fool the World Bank and the IMF. That bus is long gone. Neither the IMF, neither the World Bank, the British nor the Americans will be hoodwinked or fooled by these attempts to pull wool over their eyes.

Genuine reform in this country will involve the following issues:

♦ Resolve the crisis of legitimacy.

♦ Attempt genuine structural reform.

♦ Stop raping women, stop abducting citizens, stop arresting journalists, activists, lawyers and stop attacking the church.

♦ Uphold the constitution, be an equal member of the international community.

♦ Stop stealing elections.

Those are the things that will make the world pay attention to Zimbabwe not some murderous, dishonest, cantankerous and opaque processes that are designed for self-enrichment and designed to fool the world.

We are tired of Mnangagwa, we are tired of his vacuous, ideologically bankrupt neo-liberal policies.”