After spending more than a decade vilifying the land reform program spearheaded by the Mugabe led Zanu PF regime, Zimbabwean main opposition party has changed its tone.
In a statement released recently, Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) spokesperson Obert Gutu has called on members of the party who are interested in farming to apply through relevant government Ministry in order for them to equally benefit like fellow Zanu PF supporters.
Gutu said the party (MDC) values land reform as a way of correcting colonial land distribution imbalances and fostering food security, pointing out that it is only the manner it was carried that needs to be rationalised.
“The MDC has never been against the underlying principle of land reform. All we have been clamouring for is that the land reform should be undertaken in a holistic, sustainable and non–partisan manner,
“In fact, the MDC would like to call upon all its supporters who are in need of agricultural land to promptly apply for land allocation at the relevant government departments. All deserving Zimbabwean citizens, including MDC supporters, shouldn’t be ashamed of applying for land under the land reform program”, Gutu said.
The party said it unequivocally advocates for holistic and sustainable land redistribution in order to guarantee food security for all Zimbabweans as well as to grow our agro-based industrial infrastructure.
“There is a need for a land reform policy that affirmatively targets historically disadvantaged people, most of whom are blacks who were ruthlessly confined to barren and overcrowded communal lands by successive racist colonial governments. Thus, the land reform program is an integral component of the MDC policy on land and agriculture.
The land grab spearheaded by the Zanu PF regime in 2000 was marred by bloody violence, as a result of this ill-planned and poorly – executed exercise, the country’s commercial agricultural base was decimated as several top Zanu PF politicians and other politically well–connected individuals selfishly and corruptly awarded themselves huge tracts of arable farmland that they could not efficiently and competently manage.
From being the breadbasket of Southern Africa, Zimbabwe rapidly deteriorated into a basket case and a net importer of food as the agricultural industry suffered considerable damage from the violent and unsustainable land reform program.
To this date, millions of Zimbabweans remain food insecure and the country heavily sustains itself from importing most of its food requirements, particularly from neighbouring South Africa.
In his speech after being sworn in as Zimbabwe’s new president on November 24, Emmerson Mnangagwa stressed the role of land reform in boosting the country’s economic recovery.
Zimbabwe produced more maize in 2017 than was ever grown by white farmers, who have repeatedly been praised for making the country into the breadbasket of Africa.
Maize production in 2017 was 2.2m tonnes, the highest in two decades courtesy of favourable weather conditions and a special program for import substitution termed “Command Agriculture” implemented last year by Mnangagwa when he was still vice president.