Britain lambastes Mugabe

Britain’s foreign office minister, Peter Hain, has accused President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe of “robbing” his people of about US $60 million earmarked by Britain for anti-poverty and land reform programmes in Zimbabwe.

British media quoted Hain as saying that while Britain remained committed to the land reform programme which it and other donor countries had agreed to fund at the 1998 land conference, they could not do so if Mugabe continued with his policy of land seizures from white farmers. “The land reform programme we agreed to fund was not based on a policy of land seizure, but on the genuine empowerment of the country’s land-poor,” Hain said. Hain added that up to US $60 million that had been earmarked by Britain for anti-poverty programmes in Zimbabwe, which would include cash for land reform, had been spent in other African countries where there was a “desperate need”.