Zimbabwe -- Defiant farmers continue operations

MOST commercial farmers in the country yesterday defied a government order to cease operations from midnight on Monday and confine themselves to their farmhouses until August, when they are required to leave the properties altogether.Amendments to the Land Acquisition Act gazetted on 10 May 2002, stipulate that once a farmer has received a Section 8 acquisition order, they have 45 days to halt operations and another 45 days to leave the farm.

The farmers are expected to spend the next 45 days from 24 June confined on their farmhouses, as they prepare to leave the farms. The Commercial Farmers’ Union (CFU) spokesperson, Jennie Williams, said yesterday: “Everyone is shocked and farmers are looking for directions. Some farmers continue farming. You know the grading of tobacco has to go on. Farmers have no choice but to continue.

“There is confusion and no one knows exactly what to do.”In Matabeleland, farmers given notice to discontinue operations on their farms have ignored the order.

Sixty percent of the farms have been listed under Section 8 which gave notice to farmers to wind up operations by 24 June and to vacate the properties by the end of August.The 2 900 farmers affected represent about 60 percent of the total number of white farmers in Zimbabwe at the time of the land seizures two years ago.

In Matabeleland South more than 160 farmers were threatened with arrest and forcible eviction on Monday for failing to comply with the government order.The provincial chief lands officer, Ulibile Gwate, yesterday told the government-controlled Chronicle newspaper that the police had been given a list of the defiant farmers served with notices last November. Gwate accused the farmers of overgrazing their cattle on designated land on their properties to deliberately disadvantage resettled people.

But the farmers insisted they could not wind up 50 years of farm work in 45 days. The government has rejected their request to be allowed to stay on longer.On Friday last week, the government, through its media, said those affected by the eviction notices were a very small minority causing unnecessary panic by announcing Monday as their D-Day.

The CFU regional executive in Matabeleland said they had not received any reports of government action against any farmers, with most farmers continuing with their normal daily activities. Outside Harare, most commercial farmers continued with their farming operations yesterday despite the deadline.

Meanwhile, a Karoi farmer has filed an urgent application in the High Court challenging the constitutionality of the evictions.If a farmer served with a Section 8 disobeys the order to stop farming, they face a fine of $20 000 or two years in prison, or both.Farmers stand to lose billions of dollars if they are not able to sell their tobacco crop this year. Out of the national flue-cured tobacco crop of 170 million kg, only about 17 million kg had been sold by Monday this week on the three auction floors.

Zimbabwe, whose economy is underpinned by tobacco exports, has so far only earned about $1,7 billion from the golden leaf sales.

The bulk of the flue-cured tobacco crop is produced by commercial farmers, most of whom have been issued with eviction orders.Small-scale farmers, mostly black, this year produced only about 30 million kg of flue-cured tobacco. The government, realising there would be food shortages, asked commercial farmers to plant winter wheat despite having issued them with eviction orders. Wheat producers could lose billions of dollars from the wheat crop they planted this year if they are forced to vacate the farms in the next 45 days.

Most commercial farmers have to stop farming and vacate farms by next August.About 22 000 hectares were planted under winter wheat by commercial farmers this year. The wheat crop is harvested in September.The Minister of Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement Minister, Dr Joseph Made, said on Monday the government would not extend the June 24 deadline.

To: *AfricaWatch; Cincinatus' Wife; sarcasm; Travis McGee; Byron_the_Aussie; robnoel; GeronL; ZOOKER; ..

Too bad we can't get an all volunteer army together to save that nation. But if I were a white farmer, I'd leave. Let the bastards starve to death.

I think it's absolutely outrageous that the situation in Zimbabwe has aroused no more reaction in the US and UK than it has.

Black on white crime aside, stealing of private property, disenfranchising of land owners, starving of an innocent population - in a word, tyranny - goes on unnoticed and unremarked upon by our 'admirable' governments.

Hypocrites, all.

It isn't going to be long before we start getting propaganda from the bleeding-heart liberals laced with pictures of hollow-eyed, naked Africans trying to get the American producer to take responsibility for their suffering.

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