Zimbabwe: Urban poor till cemetery plots

The Standard (Zimbabwe) ^ | November 16, 2004

[Stoat]

Urban poor till cemetery plots


HARARE - It is midday at the Mabvuku cemetery on the eastern outskirts of the Zimbabwean capital, Harare, and a funeral is in progress. A few metres away, groups of people are preparing patches of land for planting maize and sweet potatoes.

Farming in cemeteries has been a lifeline for many Harare residents struggling to cope with the ongoing economic crisis and spiraling prices.

Lucky Marime, one of the cemetery farmers, said it was common practice to grab unused council land for farming, which then remained "in the family" until the council claimed it back.

At Mabvuku, most idle land outside and inside the cemetery had already been claimed for urban farming. "There is no space for newcomers here. If you see a piece of land not yet prepared, it does not mean it is free - it has already been booked but the owner has just not started his preparations yet," Marime explained.

Although he did not have any land in the cemetery himself, he was often hired to prepare and till land for others, he added.

Similar land encroachment is evident at two larger cemeteries in the capital, Warren Hills on Bulawayo Road and Granville on Harare's southern edges, despite the presence of council officers at all burial grounds.

Council spokesman Leslie Gwindi said that the practice of cemetery agriculture would no longer be tolerated. "What they are doing is illegal. We do not care if it has been happening for 10 years, we will nip it in the bud - cemeteries are not for agriculture. Culturally it's not right to grow foodstuffs where there are dead people," he said.

Keeping the cemeteries free from intrusion and "beefing up security" would be part of a general "clean-up" campaign currently underway in Harare's central business district, he said.

Policing large far-flung cemeteries with little or no security fencing is likely to be a mammoth task - Granville Cemetery, the country's newest and largest, stands on 100 hectares of former farmland, most of it unprotected.

Land grabbers and other intruders, including vendors, gain access through a number of entry points. The vendors can be seen trotting after a funeral cortege and then waiting at a respectful distance to be approached for service.

Dr Gordon Chavunduka, president of the Zimbabwe Traditional Healers' Association, described cemetery agriculture as "culturally wrong", but added that simply flushing out the farmers was not the answer. - IRIN.

[Stoat]

Another testament to Robert Mugabe's 'enlightened' leadership.

[Paleo Conservative]

Don't have to worry about buying fertilizer.

[xp38]

A metaphor for Zimbabwe. It has become a graveyard.

[GeronL]

geez

[RockAgainsttheLeft04]

There are few stories in modern-day Sub-Saharan Africa more tragic than the recent history of Zimbabwe. The man the world helped elect in 1980, a racist basketcase by the name of Robert Mugabe, has turned the Rhodesia that was hailed as the future of African economic progress (and a Breadbasket for Africa to boot) into a wasteland of greed, starvation, brutality and socialism in a mere 24 years. Where race relations were extremely problematic before, now they are closer to parity, with white and black alike crushed under Mugabe's suffocating heel.

Ian Smith turned out to be right. Rhodesians only got "one man, one vote, once".

[familyop]

Those are probably great places for gardens if the stiffs were not embalmed. My great-grandfather once picked up walnuts around a cemetery. ...made great-grandmother angry, but it was a fair joke in the family after that.

[Clive]

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