Years since its inception, the Land Reform and Resettlement Programme (LRRP) has been fraught with irregularities, inconsistencies and mired so deep in corrupt practices, many have simply forgotten why it was ever implemented. Sadly, its very essence has been diminished as greedy individuals mostly in high offices jostle to acquire as many chunks of land as they can grab for no good reason except to flex their puny political or economic muscle.
Opinion by Phyllis Mbanje
It is not only the administration of the process that is at fault, but the state of the acquired farms is an embarrassment to all who know the real purpose of land reform. Most of the farms that have been taken over are in a pathetic state.
The LRRP has exposed several weaknesses in the actual administration of the programme and as Justice Bharat Patel rightly pointed out early this week, the Ministry of Lands and Rural Resettlement has a mammoth task of putting its house in order. As the custodian of the programme, the ministry is supposed to set up transparent structures that will ensure that the process is orderly and fair.
Justice Patel was handing a landmark ruling in which he ordered Zanu PF MP for Seke, Phineas Chihota, to give back a farm he had unprocedurally grabbed from one Florence Sigudu. The latter had been allocated part of Denby Farm in Seke by the minister in 2005 but a Provincial Lands Committee chaired by Chihota took a decision to dispossess Sigudu of her farm on very flimsy grounds. In a wanton display of abuse of office, the MP took the farm to consolidate it with his own adjoining one.
In his hard-hitting ruling, Justice Patel noted with concern how the minister was flouting procedures with no legal ground at all. He explained that although the popularised offer letters stated that the offer may be cancelled or withdrawn, the minister could only exercise powers stipulated by the statute. He cannot withdraw the offer in the absence of an explicit statutory power to that effect. Justice Patel also said the Agricultural Land Resettlement Act which the offer letter is said to be based on does not contemplate the allocation of land for settlement through offer letters, either on their own or as precursors to formal leases. The Act does not entitle the minister or any other authority to cancel offer letters or terminate rights conferred.
It is those weaknesses in the current administration of the land reform programme that are being fronted as excuses to grab land from the weak.
A clear, transparent, accountable allocation process that is also open to judicial scrutiny is one way of bringing normality to the chaotic situation. It will also protect the poor and defenceless section of the community who obviously are not privileged to seek pricy legal advice in the event that their farms are taken by the powerful. The rampant land grabbing has ceased to be about black people taking from the white “colonialists” but about powerful black people taking from their weaker brethren.
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While administrative issues remain key in addressing the current stand-off, those who have land should really put it to good use instead of turning farms into wastelands
It is however, not all doom and gloom because a few of these farmers have actually maintained the flourishing farms and in some cases superseded the previous owners. There is a new breed of upcoming young black farmers who know exactly what to do with the pieces of land. This breed just might redeem an otherwise aimless exercise that smacks of agendas other than their intended purpose.
