Mthwakazi vows to stop farm seizure

Source: Mthwakazi vows to stop farm seizure – NewsDay Zimbabwe

BY NQOBANI NDLOVU

THE secessionist Mthwakazi Republic Party (MRP) last week stormed Siphosami Malunga’s Kershelmar Farm in Nyamandlovu, Matabeleland North province in a bid to stop government from seizing it for redistribution.

Kershelmar Farm (Private) Ltd is owned by Siphosami Malunga, who is the director for Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (Osisa).

Siphosami is the son of the late national hero Sydney Malunga.

He jointly owns the farm with businessman Charles Moyo and Zephania Dlamini, a scientist working at the National University of Science and Technology (Nust).

Lands minister Anxious Masuka last December gazetted the 553-hectare farm, also known as Esidakeni, for compulsory acquisition.

The move has been widely condemned, with critics claiming that Malunga was being punished for exposing government human rights abuses through Osisa.

Reports say Central Intelligence Organisation co-deputy director-general Gatsha Mzithulela, Zanu PF secretary for administration Obert Mpofu and Matabeleland North Provincial Affairs minister Richard Moyo were behind the move to seize the property.

Last Thursday, MRP provincial chairperson Thembelani Mfulongatshi Mpofu and other officials visited the property and resolved to resist its takeover.

“It then boggles the mind as to how did the land office agree to illegally and forcefully grab a productive black-owned farm, owned by people from Matabeleland,” the MRP said in a statement yesterday.

“We say hands off Esidakeni Farm. It belongs to the three Matabeleland sons. We condemn all these notorious individuals with Zanu PF connections.

“As a party, we will always stand by our people. We formed MRP specifically to protect, promote and defend our people and we believe in the rule of law rather than in lawlessness.”

Malunga, Moyo and Dlamini in a letter to Masuka dated June 14, revealed that they would lose over $60 million in potential revenue from their horticultural projects if government insists on its takeover.

In March, MRP activists clashed with police after they descended at Tabas Induna Farm in Ntabazinduna where they evicted former Vice-President Kembo Mohadi’s son-in-law Floyd Ambrose from the property accusing him of grabbing it from a white farmer, Brain Davies.