The province has been plagued by acute food shortages, following a poor farming season that saw farmers, most of them resettled under the land reform programme, failing to harvest anything from their fields.
The government reacted by introducing a grain loan scheme, meant to militate against hunger under which the starving households would pay back the grain after harvesting.
According to statistics obtained from the provincial administrator’s office, about 250 000 families now need urgent food aid in Manicaland. The Mutare District administrator, Simon Sigauke, last week confirmed that grain meant for the ongoing grain loan scheme had ran out before the intended beneficiaries had received their monthly allocations.
He could not say who was diverting the grain. “Villagers in the district are concerned by the rate at which grain is being delivered at GMB depots, from where it is accessed by the hungry people,” said Sigauke.
“My office has been besieged by needy people, who come to enquire when the next delivery would be made for their benefit. Each household is receiving a 50 kg bag of maize per delivery. This was not enough for those households with bigger family members.” he explained.
He said there was urgent need for government to ensure that more grain was secured in time before people starved, as the majority of them did not harvest any grain.
Sources said corruption was rising, with allegations that some Zanu PF officials working in cahoots with some Agritex workers, were diverting truckloads full of grain onto the black market. They would then sell the grain at exorbitant prices to ready buyers and then share the proceeds.
The Minister of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development, Joseph Made, recently condemned the corruption and said his ministry was ready to weed out such malpractices.
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“We are ready to weed out such unscrupulous people. I am aware that the issue of distributing grain is being politicised,” said Made.
