An Introduction to the Situation in ZimbabweDinoj Surendran01/06/2003Comments to dinoj@uchicago.edu[The views expressed here are the author's and not those of the non-existent imperialist power that makes large and urgently needed deposits to his non-existent Swiss bank account. Neither are they those of the University of Chicago, where he is a graduate student. Sources have been given where possible, but if you happen to think any facts reported here actually aren't. please contact the author. This essay is incomplete. It supersedes an even more incomplete version which appeared in August 2002.]
Let's be frank here: the main reason Zimbabwe caught the world's
attention was because of its white farmers, a handful of whom were
killed. But as Zim-bred writer Doris Lessing pointed out recently,
"Initially, the only stories that were reported were about the white
farmers. But the black population of Zimbabwe had things a thousand
times worse."
How much worse? What most black Zimbabweans worry about are rising
prices, unemployment and possible famine, not land. In a survey by the
Helen Suzman Foundation in late 2000, only 6% of them thought that
land was the most important issue facing the country. The corresponding figure in the same poll amongst
those who said they supported the ruling party was only 14%. The
figures are unlikely to have risen since then.
Inflation was well over 110% in mid-2002, and is probably higher
now. One source placed it at over 170% by November 2002. One
Zimbabwean dollar was worth sixty-seven US cents in late 1979. In
1999, one US dollar was worth Z$40. In August 2002, the figure was
about Z$700. It doubled in the next three months, to about Z$1500 in
October 2002.
There are regular queues for bread, sugar, salt and maize meal,
the staple food. In some rural areas people struggle to have a meal a
day. Food riots, at various levels of spontaneity,
size and violence, have been happening since 1998.
And that's not even getting to the scourge that has reduced the
average life expectancy from 70 to 35 years. One in four Zimbabweans
is HIV-positive, there are 2000 AIDS-related deaths each week,
and the country is projected to start suffering negative
population growth in 2003. Neighbors Botswana, with a 36% infection
rate, and South Africa join it as the first developing countries to
ever experience this phenomenon. Its population of 10.4 million in
1992 only grew to 11.6 million in 2002, owing to a decreasing birth
rate, high death rate owing to both AIDS and a collaping/collapsed health
care system, and emigration.
One more statistic: the 'Gini'
index is a rough measure of the inequality of a society. The ten
most unequal countries in 2001 were
Swaziland, Nicaragua, South Africa, Brazil, Honduras, Bolivia,
Paraguay, Chile, Colombia and Zimbabwe. Note that the Gini index
tends to be lower (indicative of more equality) for countries with larger populations.
An excellent summary of Zimbabwe's situation today is offered by Eric
Bloch, a very sharp Bulawayo-based economist. Well worth reading.
Many Africans, from ordinary folk to leaders, feel that it's very
unfair of the world to focus on Zimbabwe when there are worse things
happening elsewhere in the world that
receive far less attention. In January 2002 Mozambique Foreign
Minister Leonardo Simao accused western countries of waging a
propaganda war against Zimbabwe.
The implication is that the West only focuses on places where
whites get killed, not blacks. Examples aren't hard to come by - consider
the world's reaction,
or lack of it, to the last time Mugabe 'dealt' with a minority group
in Zimbabwe.
"Gukurahundi", a Shona word meaning "the rain that washes away the
chaff before the spring rains", was the nickname of the Fifth Brigade,
a special army unit loyal to Mugabe. In the early 1980s, it terrorized
and killed thousands of Ndebeles in their part of Zimbabwe,
Matebeleland. The whole thing was hushed up, but word trickled out.
Donald Trelford, the editor of the British newspaper The Observer,
was one of the few outsiders who managed to enter the no-go areas of
Matebeleland soon afterwards. The stories he heard were chilling:
"They began beating us with sticks and guns, bayoneting us, burning
plastic against our skin while our hands and mouths were secured. They
tore curtains, put cushions into our mouths. We were tortured for
about four hours." Trelford printed the story, Mugabe denied it (he
has since acknowledged it), and Trelford was forced to resign by the
owner of the newspapers, Tiny Rowland. Rowland had substantial
business interests in Zimbabwe and wanted to be on Bob's good side.
The Tory British government of the time felt likewise and ignored the
whole thing. The truth is out now, but how many times has he been
castigated for it in the world's press? (Or in the African media
above the Limpopo for that matter.)
All this sudden media attention has played into Mugabe's adept
hands, allowing him to be portrayed as an enemy of neo-colonialism and racism, a
defender of his nation's sovereignty against foreign imperialism, a
David refusing to be pushed around by the Goliaths Britain and the US,
a victim of a massive smear campaign - distracting attention from
more pertinent issues. He gets bonus points whenever
some Western newspaper, apparently over-eager to publish an
anti-Mugabe story, has to make an embarassing retraction when its
sources prove less than reliable. Or when he gets compared to Hitler
or Pol Pot, since any foreign journalist who could make such an
exaggeration makes it easier to say that all foreign journalists do
so. Mugabe may be "bonkers", as Desmond Tutu suggests, but he's still
sharp.
But it is silly to say that Mugabe is on the right just because the
West isn't exactly angelic. Just because someone you don't like says
there's a problem doesn't mean there isn't one. This isn't some
kind of weird Heisenbergian situation where the problem disappears as
soon as people start watching it.
And even though the white farmer angle was an important factor in
the attention received by Zimbabwe, it is not the only one. Potential
investors want to know if what's happening in Zimbabwe now could
happen in countries with similar problems, namely Namibia and South
Africa. Many South Africans worry that Mbeki's soft stance on Zimbabwe
is going to reduce the amount of foreign investment there. It
certainly hasn't helped the slide of the SA Rand in the past couple of
years.
Another reason is that Africa has
been viewed by many as a basket-case, that the only thing a black African
government is capable of doing is making things worse. Where is an
African success case? In 1980, especially after Bob announced his
policy of reconciliation, Zimbabwe was viewed as one of the best hopes
for one. The present situation has caused many African
sympathisers to sigh and shrug their shoulders while giving her
detractors another chance to say "I told you so." So while worse
things are happening in Congo and Sierra Leone, the world isn't too
concerned about them because they were lost causes in the first place.
Incidentally, right next door to Zimbabwe is an African success
story - Botswana. To quote The Economist,
Botswana ... was, at independence in 1966, one of the
world's poorest countries. One British official called it "a useless piece of territory".
To begin with, aid financed virtually all government investment and much of its
recurrent expenditure too. Then prospectors found diamonds under the
Botswanan desert. Unlike many African governments, Botswana's did not
squander the windfall. Diamond dollars were ploughed into infrastructure,
education and health. Private business was allowed to grow; foreign investment
was welcomed. Aid projects were approved only if they were sustainable and did
not duplicate the work of others.
From 1966 to 1991, Botswana's economy grew faster than almost any other in the
world. It helped that its government was unusually honest and competent. Cabinet
ministers did not award themselves huge pensions, mansions and public
contracts. In Zambia, government bigwigs drive Mercedes limousines. Those in
Botswana choose locally-assembled Hyundai sedans. Even the president, Festus
Mogae, has been seen doing his own shopping.
Alright, back to Zimbabwe.
The other extreme is to assume that everything that Mugabe says is
a lie. That's not true either. He blames Britain and the white farmers
for the current land situation, and there is an element of truth here.
And while he played a large part in ruining Zimbabwe's economy, he had
some help, and I don't mean just his cronies. But when it comes to
the way dissent in Zimbabwe is dealt with - let's just say Johnny
Cochrane would have a tough time defending him.
In general though, the truth is that Mugabe has to bear a huge -
not 100%, but 80% is still huge - share of the blame for the pitiful
state of his country today. Argue about percentages and
scapegoats all you want, it's not going to help Zimbabweans.
This section focuses on the history of land in Zimbabwe from 1890
to today. It is a history of suffering, inequality, whole- and
half-hearted attempts to rectify inequality, and more suffering. With
the odd success story here and there. No side -- Mugabe, his
party/government, Britain, white farmers, the land invaders -- is
blameless or completely evil.
This section is only as long and detailed as it is because of the
focus on this issue by the media and others. This focus has
distracted from Zimbabwe's real problems. On the other hand, it is an
important issue and people will argue about it. In which case they had
better argue with facts. This section aims to provide lots and
lots of facts.
I highly recommend the Centre for Housing Rights and Evictions
(COHRE) September 2001 document Land,
Housing and Property Rights in Zimbabwe. It far and away the most
comprehensive document on the land issue that I've found, with many
statistics. It's practically compulsory reading. I'll refer to it many
times, and will just call it the COHRE document.
Zimbabwe had several names between 1890 and 1980. All had the word Rhodesia in them, so that name is taken
to refer to Zimbabwe in this period. An accurate one-page summary of Zimbabwe's
political history from pre-1000 AD to 1992 is given at this somewhat unusual source.
The first white settlers arrived
in 1890, and the land grabbing began soon afterwards. Over the next
few decades, thousands of blacks had to leave their homes.
Legislation ensured that the most of the prime land went to
whites and that areas set aside for blacks had poorer soils and/or
less rainfall. There was also simply not enough of the latter,
resulting in serious overcrowding. White agriculture was subsidized,
black agriculture was mostly ignored.
Some educated blacks formed political parties to protect their
interests. These parties were soon banned, and two major ones resorted
to armed struggle. ZAPU, led by Joshua Nkomo, was primarily an Ndebele
party, and ZANU, led post-1976 by Mugabe, was primarily a Shona
party. (Nearly all of Zimbabwe's black population is in one of these
two tribes, with the Shona:Ndebele ratio of about 4:1.) The
resulting civil war was extremely vicious, marked by horrible
scenes of brutality from both sides. It eventually forced the white government
to give up its hold on the country. Without this armed struggle, or
Chimurenga as the Shona call it, the status quo would likely have
remained for much longer.
In 1979, Britain invited Rhodesian leaders and the Patriotic Front (PF = ZANU
+ ZAPU) to London for talks regarding how Britain would grant the
country independence. With such a divergence of opinion between the parties,
no-one expected a mutually satisfactory settlement. However, one
was eventually reached - albeit after 14 weeks - thanks to pressure on the PF by its
African supporters and the diplomatic crafts/brinksmanship of the British
mediator, Lord Carrington. The countries in question were Tanzania,
Zambia and in particular Mozambique. The latter two, being Rhodesia's
neighbors, desperately wanted the war to stop - it was ruining their
economies, they were supporting too many refugees from the civil war,
and were often the victims of strikes by the Rhodesian Army trying to
eliminate PF guerilla bases in their territory.
The PF was understandably unwilling to sign because of all the
conditions that had been put in to protect the white minority, These
"sunset clauses" were set by the Rhodesians (when asked by Carrington)
as conditions for them being willing to relinquish power.
Examples of the less contentious clauses were the freedom of parents to send
their children to schools of their choice and increased autonomy of
the Attorney-General.
[Time for a quick personal comment on these two clauses: soon
after 1980, there was an exodus of white children from state-run
schools, that were now opened up to black students, to more expensive
private schools that few blacks could afford. The growth of the black
middle and upper classes reduced the percentage of white students in
the latter schools to around 50% (depending on the school -- I don't
have any stats on this) by the mid 1990s. My parents never thought of
sending me to them owing to the cost, so I can't comment on what life
was like there. Reports of racism in some of them, e.g. "the headboy has to be white",
were not unommon. On the other hand, such schools offered a much more
multicultural experience than most state-run schools.
As for the second clause, it's long been shot
to hell, with the Zimbabwean judiciary increasingly being
government-appointed. The current Justice Minister in Mugabe's
cabinet, Patrick Chinamasa, was formerly the
Attorney-General. Other clauses were more distasteful. 20% of parliamentary seats to
be elected by whites (2% of the population) for the first seven years
of independence. Quite democratic, n'est-ce pas?
The most distasteful clause regarded land. The settlement said that in
the first ten years, the Zimbabwean government would only be able to
get white-owned land by buying it from willing sellers at market price
using hard currency that could then be taken out of the country.
The PF, particularly Mugabe, threatened to leave the talks. To
placate them, Britain offered help with land
resettlement. To quote Jeffrey Davidow, a US diplomat who followed the
talks closely, "Carrington told Mugabe and Nkomo that Britain would be
prepared to grant financial assistance for land resettlement and
redistribution schemes than an independent Zimbabwean government might
undertake." The exact amount of help was NOT specified,
according to the British government. It is
hard to believe that the PF did not ask for details and easy to
believe that Britain refused to give any.
Some sources say Britain
did promise an initial grant of £30 million. It certainly did provide £44
million over the next ten years.
David Anderson
of the School of Oriental and African Studies in London says that
£75 million in aid had been mentioned in an attempt to draw the PF to
Lancaster in the first place. I have not found this figure anywhere
else, but it's certainly not out of the question by any means. If
anyone knows more about it, especially about whether it was put in
writing, please let me know.
The United States' Carter Administration was more of an observer
than a participant at Lancaster. Here it stepped in. To aid weight to
Britain's vague promises, it made some equally fuzzy promises of aid
as well.
Meanwhile, the PF was under huge pressure from African
allies such as Julius Nyerere of Tanzania and Kenneth Kaunda of
Zambia, to settle. Samora Machel of
Mozambique told Mugabe near the end that if he didn't agree to it,
Machel would give him a nice beach villa where he could write his
memoirs -- in other words, no more Mozambiquan support for ZANU
fighters.
If the PF had walked out, then elections would probably have been
held without them, resulting in a black-figurehead-led-but-white-run
Zimbabwe with international recognition and no sanctions. The civil
war would likely continue, but with far less support from other
African countries. It might not succeed, and even if it did, the
damage to country and region would be immense. A few distasteful
sunset clauses was an acceptable price to pay for peace and winnable
elections.
The PF therefore signed. They made a statement that
the British and American assurances to "assist in land, agricultural
and economic development programmes ... go a long way in allaying the
great concern we have over the land question..."
In short, Mugabe and Co. accepted vague promises
under a lot of pressure, including from their African neighbors.
As far as Britain is concerned, it has no such obligation. According to its Minister for
International Development, Clare Short, "we do not accept that Britain
has a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in
Zimbabwe."
There are two possible obligations here: legal and moral. Many
would say Britain has the latter. Supposing this to be the case, consider the question of how much
help the new Zimbabwean government could have expected from Britain.
Decades previously, the British government had helped with land
redistribution in Kenya, spending £500 million
(when converted to today's money). They did not plan to spend that
much money this time, especially since Kenya's resettlement programme
was widely seen as a failure.
The way the Kenya scheme worked was that the white farmers would say
how much their farms were worth (overvaluing them in many cases), and
then Britain would pay part of the purchase price. The individual
black farmer buying the farm (or part of the farm) would have to pay
the rest within 30 years. Many farmers couldn't do this (why? price
too high? poor farming? lack of infrastructure? I have no idea), and
sold out their land to richer (and better?) farmers. Landlessness is
still rife in Kenya.
One lesson from Kenya was that for resettlement to be done
properly, infrastructure in addition to land had to be paid for. A
British official I emailed said Carrington made it clear at the time
that the scale of reform envisaged by the Zimbabweans was beyond the
means of any one donor country. That said, the question remains as to how much land needed to be
redistributed. A 1977 German study said 75% of white land would need
to be transferred to both reduce pressure on communal areas (where
blacks had been restricted to by Rhodesian laws) and to maintain
large-scale agriculture's contribution to the economy. Presumably this
figure was known to the Lancaster parties.
The following remarks of Garfield Todd, the former Rhodesian PM who
lost power for being too pro-black (see the first two paragraphs of
the Mhanda
interview) should also be noted. He told Lord Carrington in
Obtober 1979 that "Land provisions should be designed to facilitate
the distribution of land, not to frustrate both white land owners and
black farmers who wish to co-operate. Your suggestions are not
designed to meet the real needs of the country."
Now for the question of legal obligation.
Many critics of Britain have said that she wanted to preserve
white domination in Zimbabwe for as long as possible. The Thatcher
Administration (and it is hard to see how any other British
Administration would have done differently, in principle anyway)
definitely wanted to ensure the safety of the white minority in
Zimbabwe. The "willing buyer, willing seller" principle has always
been part of their policy, since property rights is such a cornerstone
of British Common Law.
Unfortunately, the Law makes the implicit assumption that it was
always in place. Here we have a case where land was taken from its
original occupants before such a Law was applicable. In the bad old
days, this was justified by saying that Lobengula, the Ndebele king,
had signed over such rights to the British crown in the late
1800s. This is inapplicable for two reasons: first, much of Zimbabwe
was inhabited by Shona, not the Ndebele ruled by Lobengula. Second, he
had been tricked into signing, and sent a group of representatives to
London to protest soon afterwards. If there had been a United Nations
around at the time, it would have sided with him. There wasn't and
superior British armed forces won the day.
This kind of argument generally meets with the response "That was
then, this is now", or no response. Mugabe himself has stuck to the
line "They stole the land without paying, so why should we pay?" In
this sense, he has the moral upper ground, and it is not sure where
the legal ground is.
Suppose then that we conclude that Britain is obliged to help. Now
what? There's the rub.
The trouble with all these finger-pointing arguments is that it
does not help Zimbabweans today. A lot of Africans, African leaders and liberal First
World-ers may do so, but they are simply being moronic if they think
the issue ends there. Looking back in history is good, but those who
do it should do it properly, by looking at the history of different
countries and groups. There they will find many examples of countries
and groups that have improved their lot without external assistance or
by being selective of the kind of assistance received. Saying that the
West isn't helping
merely confirms the accusation of cynics who say that Africa's is a
beggar economy, always reliant on Western aid. That may be true of
lots of countries, but it did not have to be true of Zimbabwe.
History is full of examples of groups abusing other groups. It is
inexcusable, but it's part of life. Who said life was fair? Some of
the victimized groups keep moaning about it, others pick themselves up
and move on, others stay down and die, and so on. Now, if you were a donor,
which group would you feel like helping?
A lot of
progress could have been made by the Zimbabwean government if it had
been serious about it, without Britain's assistance.
But money which could have been spent on land reform was instead
spent on luxury cars, mansions, way too many overseas trips by Bob and
his ministers, fighting in the Congo and general
corruption. University of Zimbabwe students referred him to as "Vasco
da Mugabe" and joked about him being the only person who would travel
from Harare to the Namibian capital Windhoek via London. There were plenty of donors (including countries other than Britain
which had nothing to do with Zimbabwean history, such as Kuwait and Denmark)
willing to help. But, amazingly enough, they found it hard to say yes
to a request along the lines of "Could you give me a few million to
resettle my people? After buying a new fleet of Mercs for my cabinet
ministers last week, I really can't afford it."
While it is not be relevant to the Zimbabwean question, I should
mention something here for the benefit of those who feel that all donors
are always altruistic. Many countries do give aid with the intention
of development, but not all. Cases of country X donating something to country Y just when Y is trying to decide whether to give a large
contract for housing/defence/whatever to either a company
from X or a company from a third country are - alas! - not uncommon.
And the less said about conditions that can come with World Bank or IMF
aid the better.
In 1980, 17 million hectares or 42% of Zimbabwe's land, including
75% of prime land, was owned by white farmers. A quarter of this, or
1300 farms, were acquired by the government in the next ten years, and
two years ago the figure was 29%, of which half is prime land. The
other half is classified as poor land, but is often turned productive
with irrigation. (Large scale farmers with lots of collateral find it easier than small
scale ones to get loans for irrigation schemes.) For example, sandy
soils result in the "poor land" classification, but are great for
Zimbabwe's main cash crop, tobacco.
The Zimbabwean government wanted to acquire 8 million hectares for
resettlement and resettle 162 000 families in the first five
years. This figure came on the recommendation of the Riddell
Commission in 1981, and has been described as overly optimistic and
not well thought out. It was certainly the most ambitious
voluntary resettlement program ever in sub-Saharan
Africa. (Nyerere's Tanzania had a larger one, but it wasn't voluntary.)
It was constrained by the Lancaster Agreement to a willing buyer -
willing seller scheme. "There was a
sufficient supply of vendors", and the real limitation was
money. (Some sources disagree, saying that not enough farmers
were willing to sell.)
There are quite plausible reports of some farmers overstating the
market values of their farms, and that most of the land bought was
poor and scattered since this was the first thing farmers preferred to sell.
In 1985 the policy was legally changed
(how did they manage that?) so that a fixed price was paid, and that
the payment could be in domestic (i.e. not hard) currency.
About half of the funding for this program came from foreign
donors: Britain, the European Community, Kuwait and the African
Development Bank. Britain over the decade gave Zimbabwe £44
million. Other than the EC, donors required the Zimbabwean government
to pay first and then apply for reimbursement. This proved to be a
bottleneck for some reason (not enough foreign currency in government
accounts? you mean Mercedes-Benz accepted payment in Zimbabwe dollars?).
All in all then, in the first ten years of independence farmers
sold 2.7 million hectares to the government by farmers and 52 000
families were resettled. This was a non-trivial achievement and one
could still say that Mugabe's government was interested in
redistributing land. After, this was already a larger land area than had
been redistributed in Kenya. But questions were already being asked
about whether peasants were really benefiting from it.
Britain stopped payments, saying::
"This resettlement programme was evaluated in 1988. The report
concluded that the programme had contributed to post-war
reconstruction and stability. However, the record on improving incomes
in communal and resettlement areas was patchy, and some settlers,
especially women, ended up in poverty.
The UK therefore decided
to support new and improved resettlement schemes. After the 1981
Resettlement Grant expired in 1996, the UK Government identified new
ways that the UK and other donors could support resettlement. The UK
proposed to concentrate upon schemes to benefit the rural poor and
with arrangements for them to be fully consulted about the scheme. It
also suggested a round table conference at which the Zimbabwe
Government could explain its plans, consult the people concerned and
identify donor support."
However, indications went both ways, since the same study showed "signs of potential success in
the resettlement program", according to the COHRE document (p18).
And ten years seems premature to
judge a scheme so quickly, unless things were grossly wrong. A study
by Bill Kinsey much later, in 1997, indicated that the
quality of life of resettled peasants was better than those in the
communal areas they had left behind.
However, quality of living was not the only problem in the
scheme. The list of problems can be inferred from a look at the proposals
of a Donors' Conference much later, in September 1998:
Cronyism in farm redistribution was (and still is) probably the most worrying
factor for many donors. The first official signs were in 1993/4 when
it became known that 98 previously white-owned farms had been leased
to senior government officials for a minimal charge.
More proof of this practice can be found in a list compiled by
long-time opposition figure Margaret Dongo from government documents
showing to whom acquired farms were allocated. A large fraction of
names on this list have government connections and often little
farming experience.
However, ordinary Zimbabweans who apply for land
are also getting it, and sometimes using it as well as its previous
owners.
Donors are unlikely to be willing to help as long as
misdistribution occurs. Which it still is - in the past year
there have been several reports in the independent press of government
chefs taking over large white farms and evicting those present, be
they the original farmer or landless peasants who invaded the farm
previously.
From 1990
to 1997, only 0.8 million more hectares were acquired, and 19 000 more
families resettled. Yet the restrictions of Lancaster had been
lifted. What happened?
The major reasons were a lack of both money and political
will. Donors were less willing to place money in the hands of an
increasingly colanderous government. The government didn't seem
particularly interested in spending money on resettlement either, as
reflected in its budget. In one year for example, the amounts
budgeted for resettlement, a new State Guest House and telephone
expenses for the Department of Defence were Z$10, 40 and 35 million
respectively. In late 2000 Zimbabwe Finance Minister Simba Makoni told
parliament that the country's involvement in the Congo had cost US$200
million so far and was hurting the economy. And that's US dollars,
not Zim dollars. Whether this figure is an underestimate or not,
remember that the last Zimbabwean troops in the Congo only left in
late 2002.
Furthermore, the government had turned its interest from giving
land to peasants to leasing it to larger-scale black farmers. By this time there were 750 large scale black
commercial farmers, 350 of whom had bought their own farms and 400 of
whom were leasing 0.4 million hectares of state-owned land.
Maintaining
agricultural production had become more important than land
distribution. Especially since the World Bank thought so.
The question of whether large scale farming is more
productive than small scale farming is a major one, and crucial to the
entire debate. But even if small scale farming can be as efficient, it
can only be so after certain conditions have been met, such as
training and the financial capability to buy things like
fertilizer.
But while little resettlement was actually going on, laws that
aimed to speed up the process were being passed. In 1992, the Land
Acquisition Act permitted the government to seize farms and compensate
the farmers with an amount it felt was fair. The existing law
remember, permitted the government to buy lands for an amount it felt
was fair, but only if the farmer was willing to sell. The next two
years would see it list a handful of farms for acquisition, but not
acquire any as it did not follow its own procedures for acquisition
correctly and farmers could and would stop the acquisitions in
court. The scale of attempted acquisition was small since it hadn't
budgeted enough money to pay for more, even at its own definition of a
fair market price.
In 1994, the government formed a Commission of Inquiry into
Appropriate Agricultural Land Tenure Systems headed by Mandiwana
Rukuni of the University of Zimbabwe. Its report made several
recommendations on how to proceed with land reform, such as
introducing a land tax, speeding up the procedure by which farms
were subdivided into plots and granting titles to those receiving the
land. The report was generally considered to be a concrete and viable
plan of action. [If anyone knows where to find this report online,
please let me know.]
The Rukuni report was completely ignored by the government. One
reason was that it favored decentralisation of the process. In his own
words (from a later paper):
"Highly centralized systems of government were judged as the most serious threat to tenure security for land users under all types of tenure in Zimbabwe."
Unfortunately, governments tend to like centralization. Therefore, under the Zimbabwean Government's current Fast
Track Land Reform programme, resettled farmers do not
actually own the land, but lease it from (and are therefore at the
mercy of) the state.
To come : Agreements between the Zim government and donor
agencies in the 1990s (basically, the donors laid down conditions for
resumption of aid - such as a return to law and order in the country -
the ZG didn't meet them), the treatment of opposition parties in
Zimbabwe, more on everyday living conditions, human rights
violations, food availability (low), ...
The following sites give regular reports on Zimbabwe.
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