Govt abusing taxpayers’ money
WHY should the taxpayer pay for the farms and not the beneficiaries? As you so rightly say “it is the former colonial masters, Britain, who should compensate our citizens for the centuries of plunder of our resources”.
The British plundered our natural resources and turned them into highly-productive commercial enterprises at the same time enslaving the ever-growing population who had to grow the maize, wheat, soyabeans, tend to the commercial farmers’ cattle and milk them so that they could eat and produce more food.
There was a side benefit for all this hard work — the rest of the population was also able to access this food too and we became known as the breadbasket of Africa. The other benefit of this plunder was that the commercial farmers became rich enough to buy tractors, tobacco curing facilities, build dams and have fancy and expensive irrigation systems so they were not reliant on the erratic rainfall.
Of course, the commercial farmers had to do nothing except steal the land from the rightful owners. That is why government does not believe the farmers should get compensation for the land even though they had to pay the former white governments for it. This was so the former governments could build roads, schools, hospitals, etc for all the citizens of the county, black and white.
We will lay all the blame on the British and conveniently ignore that a large percentage of the commercial farmers were from South Africa and other countries.
The British are rich enough to pay up. Morality does not come into it. To get the record straight, Britain was never our master as we were a self-governing State from 1923 and owned by the British South African Company before that.
The land grab has become generally accepted as having been a necessary evil to correct the injustice of the former system, especially in the eyes of the “educated” city slickers.
The land is now firmly in the hands of indigenous farmers. But is it? No, it is in the hands of corrupt politicians and compliant bootlickers who in the main have no interest in farming. They have been given billions of dollars worth of inputs and implements which they have squandered all at the taxpayers’ expense.
Taxpayers have had to foot their electricity bills. Why should it stop now? The supporters of the “land reform programme” are in the main the city slickers and the taxpayers so they should carry on footing the bill. The beneficiaries of the programme have not been the rural poor, so why should other countries foot the bill for the well-connected to get another US$3,5 billion without taking any responsibility for their actions. (They have actually benefitted to the tune of US$10 billion if the valuators are to be believed). The world is well aware of the US$15 billion diamonds that have gone to the same Zanu PF lackeys as well as the other billions a year lost to corruption.
The rural communities have been the biggest losers as they now have no opportunities of employment on the former commercial farms, unless they are prepared to work for slave wages. They were largely not supportive of the land grab as the people on the ground, but were voiceless in the face of Zanu PF thugs and violence in 2000.
To put it in a nutshell. The programme was never about empowering the indigenous population and cannot be funded by well-wishers with a conscience. It must be funded by Zimbabweans. The beneficiaries will not do that as it would be a mockery of their privileged status.