Hunzvi backs “fast-track”

The leader of the Zimbabwe War Veterans Association Chenjerai Hunzvi told IRIN on Wednesday he was confident that the government’s “fast-track” land redistribution programme would be completed before the start of the rainy season in October.

“I would want everyone to be settled by October. Every Zimbabwean will take part to ensure that this issue is resolved, that it is taken care of,” the controversial newly-elected MP said. “We will do the resettlement the Zimbabwean way. We will give back to the people the land that was grabbed by the imperialists in the 1890s.”

The government aims to acquire five million hectares of mainly white-owned commercial farms, without paying compensation for the land, for the resettlement of 500,000 rural families. The war veterans have spearheaded the programme by illegally occupying more than 1,000 farms, amid reports of violence and intimidation against farmers, their workers, and suspected supporters of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

But Hunzvi denied the veterans’ government-backed campaign had deliberately used violence. “The 1890s was organised violence, they massacred masses of Zimbabweans and grabbed our land. Here in Zimbabwe today there’s no such thing as organised violence. If the commercial farmers are saying that, then they are inviting violence.”

In reference to reported divisions within the government over the land policy which, although backed by regional heads of states, has been condemned by Western donors and local business leaders, Hunzvi said: “That’s the ministers’ and president’s problem. My concern is the land.”