This is a great move by the new regime. I hope they follow through in returning or compensating for all the theft and destruction that occured.
These Boers (literally “Farmers” in Afrikaans) are really like gold, from the viewpoint of human capital. A hundred Boer families fled Zimbabwe to Zambia, where they now grow 70% of the country’s grain. They are not just farmers -
they are World-class super farmers. Zimbabwe needs them badly, if they want to restore their agriculture.
This first restoral could just be for show, because everyone is watching for this. Investment could pour into Zimbabwe now that Mugabe is gone, but investors need reassurance that their property won’t be stolen like the Farmers’ property was. So they might just restore a couple of high profile properties, just to draw in a few bigger deals.
The farms were supposedly confiscated to distribute to “Blacks” and “War Veterans”, but the title to the land uniformly ended up in the names of the high-ranking members of the ruling Zanu-PF Party. This farm that is being returned, was held by Grace Mugabe, the former President’s wife, who has just been purged from the Zanu-PF, on very bad terms. So this might be as much about punishing her, as it is about trying to restore rule of law to property rights. The land held by Party Members in good standing could require a different deal.
In several cases, farmers have returned over the years, to work some of the farms as employees or tenant farmers, without getting title back. Sometimes they even end up clearing more money than when they owned the land (the owners give themselves sweetheart deals from the Government they run). But most farmers have stayed away, and most of the farms have have degraded into horribly unproductive patchy peasant gardens, or reverted to wild bushland.
It has been estimated that 8 or 9 billion dollars would be enough for a decent program of restitution, to kick off an agricultural gold rush of sorts in Zimbabwe (which in turn could provide the investor confidence for and actual gold rush - Zimbabwe is mineral rich). It is doable, but it will be much slower and less effective if they don’t make things right with the Boers, and entice them back to the farms.
If the welcome mat is put out for the Boers, and the terms are good, they will be rocket fuel for the Zimbabwean economy. With a business-savvy candidate just elected by the South African ANC Party (replacing the disastrous Jacob Zuma as the Party head), much of the wider South African Development Community could be set for takeoff next year.
Some of those white farmers accepted an invitation from neighboring Mozambique to farm there; while there is a language barrier they seem quite content. The Africans there still remember when the Portuguese ran it, and while there were serious issues the plumbing and electricity worked. Now they’ll get the best of both worlds (independence AND civilization), and the farmers do as well (stability and prosperity).
The “war veterans” nonsense was exposed as a hoax when journalists pointed out that the thugs killing farmers and beating their black workers were in their 20s - they were either babies or not born yet during the war (which ended in 1980). The farms were given as political favors, but the white owners and black workers were gone - so nature just reclaimed the land (and the country ran out of food, and then money as it had to buy it elsewhere).
Africa is just reverting to what it was before Europeans arrived; the only difference is they wear clothing now. Nothing else has changed; the president of South Africa was openly married to three women simultaneously, Arabs from the north still capture black slaves in the south, and tribes kill each other for shiny things.
I guess I am confused. Based on this Reuters article, I thought the government was going to nationalize the bank and take land away from the white farmers without compensating them. Are they taking land away from the people who stole farms from the white farmers?
Wait, a business owner got elected to lead the ANC? Interesting, that would be like a white conservative male who knows he is male being elected to lead the DNC! :-)