via Zimbabwe: Stealing farms will not empower society or grow our economy | The Zimbabwean 22 September 2014
In the lawless world of Zimbabwean agriculture in 2014, all it takes for a man to steal someone’s home, his livelihood and his crops is an “offer letter” – signed by the Minister of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development. It is as simple as that.
In the case of Centenary Farm in the Figtree district of Matabeleland South province, the workers and their families were all evicted from their homes of many decades on August 5. There was no court process. Police refused to stop the thugs from evicting the farm workers, even though there was a High Court order to stop them. On that occasion I sat at Figtree police station with the farm owner, Dave Conolly, pleading with police that they adhere to the High Court order and protect the farm workers. But lawlessness prevailed and they refused to act.
The Conollys had irrigated food crops in the ground and, with the High Court order in their favour, they bravely tried to carry on farming. Zimbabwe, after all, needs crops – and it needs food. It also needs employment and investment. The economy will continue to decline rapidly without them, and more people will join the ever increasing ranks of the suffering.
Ironically, the Ministry of Agriculture’s website still states that: “The future of Zimbabwe … lies in the development of a diversified, vibrant, competitive and efficient agricultural sector.”
The person wanting Conolly’s well-established commercial farm is a “chef” – a very senior man in the President’s office. Such men, in lawless states, can do what they like. All they need is an “offer letter;” and in the lawless chef world of Zimbabwe, that gives them carte blanche to act in contempt of High Court orders and steal with impunity. The signature and stamp of a judge of the High Court is of no consequence when a chef arrives with an “offer letter” signed by a minister – especially when that chef is Dr Ray Ndhlukula, Deputy Chief Secretary to the President and the Cabinet. Dr Ndhlukula is also in charge of the government’s ZimAsset programmme for food and food security, announced in December 2013.
The irony of this is that the stated vision of the ZimAsset Plan is: “Towards an Empowered Society and a Growing Economy”. The execution of this Plan will be guided by the following Mission: “To provide an enabling environment for sustainable economic empowerment and social transformation to the people of Zimbabwe.”
Yesterday, however, the workers on Centenary Farm were stopped from growing their crops by Dr Ndhlukula’s thugs. Conolly was chased out of his home. Barricades were put up to stop him coming back and irrigating or reaping the 300,000 onion plants he still has in the ground, or planting the 50,000 cabbage seedlings he has ready to plant this week.
There was no choice but for him and his workers to go to the police station again. The police are there to uphold the law after all – but not it seems in Zimbabwe where the President’s racist pronouncements and policies reign unchallenged. Yesterday, after the Conollys and their workers had sat at Figtree police station for eight hours, they were told by a Deputy Commissioner in Harare that in effect, if Dr Ndhlukula had an offer letter, he could do what he liked.
The offer letter is yet to be produced – but the Conollys and their workers left the police station, deeply distressed, as so many thousands of farmers, farm workers and their families have before them, without being offered protection.
It is difficult to explain to someone from another country what it is like to be told by the police that they will not uphold the law and protect you. It’s a bit like a football game where the referee allows one side to break all the rules and refuses to blow the whistle when people are fouled and kicked and injured – and where none of the rules are adhered to. The players on the other side play by the rules – but the referee gives red cards to all of this team’s members. They have to limp off the field and leave a bunch of thugs with an open goal. The same thugs then move on to the next game to do the same thing all over again, with the same referee.
In the Bible, we read that the days the prophet Micah lived in were no different to the days we are currently living through in Zimbabwe: “They covet fields and seize them, and houses and take them. They defraud a man of his home.” [Micah 2:2]
Conolly’s Centenary farm is not the first that Dr Ray Ndhlukula has taken, despite the government’s widely stated “one man, one farm” policy. We know of at least two others: Wilfred Hope’s farm in Marula and Vlakfontein – otherwise known as Subdivision 2 of Marula Block. Centenary farm is Dave Conolly’s only farm.
It is widely believed in Zimbabwe that Dr Ndhlukula’s strong relationship with the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Lands and Rural Resettlement, Mrs Sophia Tsvakwi, enables him to get offer letters for farms on demand. In his position, nobody will dare stop him. The law means nothing to powerful men in ZANU PF. They are above the law, untouchable, immune to prosecution. They can do what they like – and their greed knows no bounds. In many cases, the wealth they’ve generated at the expense of poor Zimbabweans is staggering.
As was also the case in the Old Testament with King Ahab and his wicked wife, Jezebel, Naboth’s vineyard was taken. So in Zimbabwe, a chef takes the Conolly’s home, stops an entire community from being able to reap its crops, takes the farm and leaves the workers homeless and jobless “because it is in (his) power to do so.” [Micah 2:1]
The Bible has a warning for men like this: “… the Lord says: I am planning a disaster against this people from which you cannot save yourselves.”
The likes of Dr Ndhlukula would be wise to look well at the demise of King Ahab and Queen Jezebel, and turn back and repent before they bring more suffering upon the people of Zimbabwe – and, ultimately, divine retribution upon themselves.
Ben Freeth
Spokesperson – SADC Tribunal Rights Watch
Cell: +263 773 929 138 E-mail: freeth@bsatt.com
Further reading: ZimAsset will not solve our problems – Charles Mangongera, researcher
COMMENTS
As we all get poorer in this godforsaken country we live in, soon these so called big wigs will start taking our private homes purely because they like the look of it. There will be no warning – just appear at our gates and tell you to get out because they have an offer letter and your home (belonging to anyone who isn’t ZanuPF) will be taken on the grounds that “you have taken “our” land”. Until such time that we remove this scourge from “our” Zimbabwe, there will be no confidence or trust. Mark my words.
WE NEED A DECENT AND CORRUPTION FREE GOVERNMENT! LEGALISED THEFT, THIS IS! COMMANDERIN THIEF
Ben. The damage is done, the milk is spilt, what difference does one more farm make. Zimbabwe is already firmly on the tracks of wherever it is going. I know it makes no sense from where we’re watching therefore we must accept that it’s Gods will that this destruction has taken place.
Stealing the onion crop now, r u Dr Do Little?.If u really r a proper doctor u r really a disgrace to that profession but methinks u r just another useless prospective Phd candidate for vegetable farming
Shenanigans I don’t know why you are obsessed with that name. You know full well that I use that profile. This is the second time you have used that name.
The real Doctor do little if it was not a fictional story would probably be insulted by the comparison. The Character reads as follws “John Dolittle, MD, is a respected physician and quiet bachelor living with his spinster sister in the small English village of Puddleby-on-the-Marsh. His love of animals grows over the years and his household menagerie eventually scares off his human clientele, leading to loss of wealth. But after learning the secret of speaking to all animals from his parrot Polynesia, he takes up veterinary practice.” No wonder why you are annoyed.
U got me there.No offense meant
Ben. Unless we confront this evil head on and sacrifice our blood nothing will change.I know not of any people who have been abused this much and have not died for what is rightly theirs.That day is coming when we unite as one black and white. In case of doubt I am black and have been a victim of this wicked regime an living in exile away from my family.When I come back I will not
I am also a victim of this wicked regime and now live away from my folks who are now old and need me to be around. The whole family is now scattered all over the world running away from the devil himself and the poverty he has induced on us. Victims include Masiwa, Thomas Mapfumo, etc and some of our best brains.
Hang in there everybody – our day will come. We all know, and have documented, the names of the perpetrators of violence and injustice. These files are already lodged in The Hague waiting for the time.
That time to prosecute is now.
Micah Chapter 2 will apply. Judgment is coming!
Whats the big deal. Farms, property and business invasions are going on for the last 14 years and nothing has changed. Why are we making a big issue of it now. It is too late the damage is done through greed and arrogance. This is what they call liberation so accept it like you have always. What the hell is the big deal.
Our ancestors cried even more than you guys when you stole their land in the fist place.
This theft should be stopped