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Land at heart of Second Chimurenga THIS is the first part of an article that looks at the
land situation in Zimbabwe before and after Independence.
In recent months, more than 23 years after gaining independence and majority rule, the Government of Zimbabwe finally redistributed the remaining approximately 4 000 surplus commercial farms owned by white people — the whites having had up until now a virtual monopoly over commercial farming in Zimbabwe. According to Stephen Chan, "In 1992, 4 500 mostly white farmers owned 11,5 million hectares. This was one third of the entire country. Seven million peasants lived on 16,4 million hectares of 'communal' farmland." Since Independence, the Government had purchased 3,3 million hectares (for the resettlement of dispossessed black farmers). It is obvious that this situation was iniquitous. Moreover, it was one which was always at the heart of the liberation movement, the Second Chimurenga. In fact it is fair to say that the millions of Zimbabwean peasants supported and fought in the war of liberation against settler colonialism precisely because they were cut off from the land and their livelihoods. It is not always realised that for them their expropriation at the hands of white settlers was not a matter of the dim and distant past. As David Blair explains in Degrees in Violence, after 1945 "thousands of new white settlers were flocking to Rhodesia and many had been promised farms by the British government. Demobilised soldiers were offered the chance to farm in Africa as a reward for service in the Second World War, and Rhodesia opened up new tracts to provide for them . . . "Quietly, with no fanfare, vast numbers of blacks were moved to make way for the new settlers . . . No fewer than 85 000 black families were evicted between 1945 and 1955, totalling perhaps 425 000 people. Considering that the black population in 1945 barely exceeded 1,5 million, something approaching 30 percent of all 'natives' were moved from their homes. "A burning sense of grievance certainly existed. Land had been stolen, with blacks herded into 'Native Reserves' while their white rulers took possession of the most fertile fields." At the height of the liberation struggle, members of Zanu-PF, the organisation which was most representative of the demands of the peasants and which therefore, became and has remained, the leading party in the Zimbabwean people's struggle for emancipation, would frequently stress the importance of solving the land question. The reason the peasants could never be satisfied by simply seeing a few black faces sitting in government positions was that for them the war was all about land, and without gaining land, the war would have been fought in vain. President Mugabe, Zanu-PF's leader, was always at pains to point out that he wanted the transfer of land to the majority population to be done consensually, with the white farmers, on the one hand, receiving compensation (to be provided by the British government who had been behind the 19th century expropriation of Zimabwe's soil by British settlers) and on the other being able to retain modest-sized holdings that would enable them to sustain their livelihoods. He duly undertook during the Independence negotiations at Lancaster House in London in 1978 that there would be no land redistribution without compensation, since at the time he did not believe forcible land redistribution would be necessary. Stephen Chan explains: "(President) Mugabe was certain that John Major had reassured him that Britain would indeed assist with funds for compensation. Tony Blair (the present prime minister) . . . thought that Britain was not committed to such previous understandings. "It had been an understanding in principle; figures had been loosely suggested, but there was never any formal document of binding agreement. To that extent, Blair was within his rights. "However, from the very first great push to resolve the Rhodesian issue in the mid-1970s, under Henry Kissinger, the matter of compensation — subscribed to in hefty sums by the international community — was always an accepted principle. It was implicit in the Lancaster House talks, but Carrington ensured that, although he recognised that a future government (of Zimbabwe) would want to widen the ownership of land, it found no formal enunciation in the final agreement. (President) Mugabe was asked why he had given way, at Lancaster House, on the land issue. 'We had to. That is the 'giving way' that I talked of, having to compromise on certain fundamental principles, but only because there was a chance, in the future, to amend the position' Stephen Chan, who is certainly no friend of (President) Mugabe, nevertheless considers he was a victim of British imperialist treachery. Once it finally became clear that Britain was not going to honour its obligations, then (President) Mugabe made it extremely clear that land redistribution would proceed without compensation. As early as 1996 he was already saying: "We are going to take the land and we are not going to pay for the soil. This is our set policy. Our land was never bought (by the colonialists) and there is no way we could buy back the land. However, if Britain wants compensation they should give us money and we will pass it on to their children". — www.lalkar.demon.co.uk/issues/contents/jul2003/zim.html l To be continued The
Mulindwas Communication Group
"With Yoweri Museveni, Uganda is in anarchy" Groupe de communication Mulindwas "avec Yoweri Museveni, l'Ouganda est dans l'anarchie" |
