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Zanu PF MP trashes land reform programme

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Mutasa South MP Irene Zindi (Zanu PF) last Tuesday tore into the party’s land reform programme describing it as a huge failure as it had failed to economically empower most Zimbabweans.

by VENERANDA LANGA

Mutasa South MP Irene Zindi (Zanu PF) last Tuesday tore into the party’s land reform programme describing it as a huge failure as it had failed to economically empower most Zimbabweans.

Zindi was contributing to debate on the Presidential Speech when she said the land reform programme needed to be revisited in order to stimulate production.

She became the second Zanu PF MP to publicly berate the land reform exercise after Sanyati MP Blessed Runesu Geza made a similar analysis early this year.

“The idea behind the land reform programme was to economically empower Zimbabweans, ensure Zimbabweans earned a living from farming and see farming from a business point of view, but the situation obtaining does not really point to the three things,” Zindi said.

“There is an element of uncertainty over a clause which says the minister can repossess land if they feel so and that alone brings uncertainty in people who would have been allocated the land because they do not have lease agreements.”

She said the clause that gave the Lands minister powers to repossess land should be removed.

“In terms of borrowing, the whole lease agreement itself is not anything that is bankable with the bankers and this leaves the farmer with no other option in terms of accessing loans in order for them to be productive on their farms. Land reform programmes in Namibia and Zambia ensure lease agreements are bankable,” she said.

Zindi said meetings between government and the Bankers’ Association of Zimbabwe had established that bankers wanted lease agreements that had security and were bankable, adding the responsibility now lied with the Executive to make decisions to ensure farmers were productive.

“Most of the farmers who were allocated land during the land reform programme are handicapped in terms of production because they were unable to access loans,” she said.

She also took a dig at the Agriculture Marketing Authority (AMA) saying it was not visible on the ground to assist farmers market their produce.

“Farmers have nightmares in terms of marketing their produce, particularly concerning horticultural produce — tomatoes, vegetables, the highly perishables — resulting in some losing almost half their produce simply because of not accessing markets. AMA has remained so alien and its activities are unknown by the farmers on the ground,” Zindi said.

She said AMA should come up with a framework in terms of assisting farmers with their agricultural produce.