A GOVERNMENT announcement that 67 formerly foreign-owned farms seized during the country’s violent land reform programme will be returned to their former owners has sparked fury among ex-combatants.
Agriculture minister, Anxious Masuka, told lawmakers in Parliament that the transfer involved farms owned by individuals from Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and the former Yugoslavia that were protected under the Bilateral Investment Promotion and Protection Agreements (BIPPA).
The move comes as President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s administration seeks to rebuild ties with Western nations and secure debt relief after more than two decades of economic isolation.
The country’s foreign debt stood at US$13,6 billion as of September 2025, including US$7,7 billion in arrears.
International lenders called for reforms, including the resolution of land disputes as conditions for debt restructuring and financial assistance.
The government agreed to a US$3,5 billion compensation deal with about 4 000 former commercial white farmers in 2020, but payment has been slow due to financial constraints.
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It subsequently altered the deal to include dollar bonds, but the revamped offer was rejected by a number of the farmers.
Zapu war veterans said their farms and properties seized at the height of the Gukurahundi atrocities have not been returned.
Zapu president, Sibangilizwe Nkomo, said the move to return the farms to former farmers was “outrageous and provoking”.
He added that the government seized Zapu and Zipra farms in 1982 and they were returned.
“They are now rushing to return land to foreigners. We are crying and complaining that they must return our farms which we bought, but they refuse,” Nkomo said.
In 1982, the government seized farms and companies belonging to PF Zapu under the Unlawful Organisation Act, after accusing its late leader Joshua Nkomo of planning to overthrow then Prime Minister the late Robert Mugabe following the alleged discovery of arms caches.
Those properties were never returned.
In 2019, Mnangagwa promised to return Zipra properties, but little has been done.
In May 2025, a group of Zipra veterans, widows and children of deceased ex-combatants set up camp in Chinhoyi, demanding the return of Nitram Holdings properties allegedly taken during the Gukurahundi era.
Zipra war veteran and Bulawayo Zapu secretary Vivian Siziba, said the government was wrong to authorise farm invasions in the first place.
“Those farms were acquired lawfully after independence with the approval of the Zimbabwe government. It was the government’s naivety and folly to authorise the occupation of those farms without due consideration of Bilateral Investment Promotion and Protection Agreements,” Siziba said.
Ibhetshu LikaZulu secretary-general Mbuso Fuzwayo added: “It’s important to pay and do things legally, but when are they going to return the Zipra and Zapu properties? Many citizens are owed compensation by the government and Zipra guerrillas still expect their properties.”
National Democratic Working Group deputy spokesperson Silenkosi Moyo said the return of farms to former owners was an insult to Zimbabweans and the late liberation struggle heroes.
“Land belongs to Zimbabweans. The government should settle the debt using other sources of finance like mineral proceeds. This is self-volunteering for recolonisation, surrendering to them and admitting its failure to use the land.”