---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 02 Jun 2000 18:46:57 -0400 From: Mine Aysen Doyran <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: White farm families pack as Zimbabweannounces land seizures http://www.cnn.com/2000/WORLD/africa/06/02/zimbabwe.landoccupati.ap/index.html White farm families pack as Zimbabwe announces land seizures June 2, 2000 Web posted at: 10:07 AM EDT (1407 GMT) HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) -- Some white farmers in Zimbabwe began packing their belongings Friday, fearing landless blacks would take over their property after the government announced it would immediately start seizing 804 mostly white-owned farms. Farmers' leaders urged farmers to avoid panic in the southern African country where the government has ignored constitutional ownership rights and laws protecting private property during the often-violent occupations of more than 1,400 white-owned farms that began in February. "Our biggest fear is that there will be an influx onto the farms by people who are just going to go shopping" for land, equipment, livestock and property, said Colin Cloete, an official of the Commercial Farmers Union. District union officials were preparing community programs to help farmers in the event of new occupations sanctioned under new land nationalization laws, Cloete said. The programs would help farmers relocate families, protect farm workers, manage cattle, other livestock and existing crops, and remove household goods. The state-run Herald newspaper today published the government notice listing 804 properties and their title deed numbers over seven full pages. A handful of farms on the list were identified as black-owned. Friday's notice, signed by Agriculture Minister Joyce Mujuru, said the "compulsory acquisition" of the farms was being carried out under amended laws passed by ruling party lawmakers in April. Those laws empower the government to nationalize land without paying compensation. The farms were among those on a list issued by the government in 1998 after their owners had fought the state's seizure plans in court. That list included 841 farms, and there was no indication given why some had been omitted from today's list. The Herald, in an accompanying report, said the notice gave owners 30 days to submit written objections to the nationalization of their farms, but that the new land laws gave them no rights to contest seizure. Vincent Kwenda, director of land acquisition in President Robert Mugabe's office, told the newspaper that the farms would be resettled by landless blacks immediately after owners received individual notices of seizure from the government, possibly next week. New settlers would move onto the land first, with access roads, water points and other infrastructure being developed later, he said. Cloete, the farmers union official said that under the new law, the state was obliged to hold off any resettlement for at least 30 days once notice was given. That would mean the state could not act before July 2. But the government, which has ignored ownership rights in the past, said it would start seizing the farms immediately. It was not immediately clear whether squatters on farms not among the 804 to be nationalized would be forced off land they have claimed. Since February, ruling party militants and veterans of the bush war that ended white rule in Rhodesia -- as Zimbabwe was known before independence from Britain -- have taken over more than white-owned 1,400 farms, saying they are protesting the slow pace of the government's land nationalization program. Mugabe has described the illegal occupations as a justified protest against unfair land ownership mainly by the descendants of British settlers. About 4,000 white farmers own about a third of productive land that supports 2 million farm workers and their family members, while 7.5 million people live on the rest. Most of them are subsistence farmers. The Movement for Democratic Change party, the biggest threat to the ruling party in parliamentary elections slated for June 24-25, accuses Mugabe of allowing the occupations and promising free land to rural poor to bolster his flagging popularity, and to punish white farmers for openly supporting the opposition. At least 30 people, most of them opposition supporters, have been killed in political violence that began in February. Five of the dead were white farmers. Copyright 2000 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, re -- Mine Aysen Doyran PhD Student Department of Political Science SUNY at Albany Nelson A. Rockefeller College 135 Western Ave.; Milne 102 Albany, NY 12222 _____________________________________________ NetZero - Defenders of the Free World Click here for FREE Internet Access and Email http://www.netzero.net/download/index.html
