SOME white commercial farmers who accepted compensation from the government after their farms were seized under the violent land reform programme are now destitute, farmers’ representative bodies have said.

An estimated 200 out of the 4 000 white commercial farmers that were in the country in 2000 have so far been compensated.

But the Commercial Farmers’ Union (CFU) said the majority of those compensated got less than 10% of the real value of their properties.

“Most of those who accepted the compensation were elderly people who were so desperate,” said CFU president Deon Theron. “But now some of them are destitute because they quickly exhausted the paltry compensation they were given during the Zimbabwe dollar era.”

Some are living with friends while others are being housed by charitable organisations.
The Southern African Farmers’ Alliance (Safa)  concurred saying those who took the offer were desperate because they had nothing to live on. Others wanted to leave the country.

Most feared for their lives after traumatic experiences at the hands of war veterans, who forced them to flee their farms.

Chris Jarrett, the chairman of Safa last week said some of the farmers were sick and wanted money for medication.

He described the payments as “extortion”.

“We heard of another couple with a small property in the Midlands who accepted what was offered as they were ill and destitute and desperately needed money for their medical bills,” said Jarrett.

“To get an idea of the pitiful compensation government was prepared to pay, a farmer in Inyathi was offered what could then buy a very old second-hand pick-up truck as ‘fair’ compensation for 19 000 thousand acres which was fenced and paddocked, also having a homestead, boreholes, pumps, outbuildings and cattle handling facilities.”

Others, said Jarrett, accepted the compensation because they were leaving the country permanently. Efforts to get specific amounts of what the farmers got were fruitless as farmers’ representative bodies said they needed consent from the affected individuals.

But some of the white commercial farmers have not lost hope of regaining their properties or at least getting fair compensation.

BY OUR STAFF

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