White farmer in court over alleged murder

A white Zimbabwean farmer appeared in court on Wednesday, charged with murdering a black man who had been given land on his property under a controversial government resettlement scheme, Reuters reported.

Philip Bezuidenhout was not asked to plead when he appeared briefly before a provincial magistrate accused of the murder of 31-year-old Febian Mapenzauswa. Bezuidenhout was denied bail and remanded in custody until 1 August. The magistrate’s court was packed with President Robert Mugabe’s war veteran supporters. Bezuidenhout, 51, allegedly ran over Mapenzauswa and dragged him under his truck for 20 metres at the farm near Odzi in eastern Zimbabwe on Saturday.

Mapenzauswa, an accountant with a timber milling company, was among a group of men who had gone to see their new plots on Bezuidenhout’s farm, which had been targeted under a government programme to seize white-owned farms for redistribution to landless blacks. Bezuidenhout’s brother, Fritz, who has gone into hiding in fear of revenge attacks, was quoted by Zimbabwe’s independent ‘Daily News’ as saying Mapenzauswa had been knocked over accidentally when his brother fled from veterans who had come to his farm. Veterans’ leaders have condemned Mapenzauswa’s alleged murder and warned farmers on occupied properties to move out for their own safety.