Pamela. T. Munyoro
Harare, Zimbabwe (News 0f The South) – Former commercial white farmers have distanced themselves from the US$3.5 billion global compensation agreement penned by the government, saying it is too little and some farmers, argue that the agreement was signed under pressure.
Zimbabwe has agreed to pay $3.5 billion as a way to compensation the white farmers whose land was violently taken by the government, two decades ago to resettle black families.
The farmers are set to benefit from a landmark deal, on average, each of the 3,500 people who applied for compensation will receive almost $1 million (€840,000).
The SADC Tribunal Rights Watch said the Global Compensation Agreement signed by government with two farming organizations raises serious concerns.
The government placed the farming organizations under considerable pressure to sign the agreement within a very short timeframe, stating it was their last chance to receive a compensation offer from the government.
Ben Freeth, who represented the farmers at the Sadc Tribunal and the Sadc Tribunal Rights Watch spokesperson, in a statement said a significant number of the former farmers, who were financially hamstrung, elderly and in poor health, were pressured to sign.
He was also concerned by Patrick Chinamasa’s active involvement on publicity matters or otherwise, on the agreement, having been Zimbabwe’s Justice Minister who initiated a 2012 challenge for the disbandment of the SADC Tribunal.
This was after Zimbabwe’s dispossessed commercial farmers had successfully sued the government through the regional court over discrimination and failure to obtain justice within local courts.
Chinamasa noted that the conclusion of the Global Compensation Agreement was “an acceptance by white commercial farmers that with respect to compensation for land, they should look elsewhere and not to the people of Zimbabwe nor to the Zimbabwe government”.
In response Freeth said, we wish to distance ourselves from the global compensation agreement that the CFU, SACFA-Z and the Valuation Consortium were under extreme pressure to sign and within a minimal timeframe, with no clear reasons why they are in a rush.
This program still divides public opinion in Zimbabwe as opponents see it as a partisan process that left the country struggling to feed itself. But its supporters say it has empowered landless Black people.
The reality is that the government is broke and although the parties have agreed to a sum of US$3.5 billion, there is no money available or pledged, and the farming organizations are expected to work with the government to raise it internationally.
At the same time, these farmers are not supposed to be compensated as the government is doing them a favor, making it a blessing in disguise for the Zimbabwean government in boosting the economy with that money.
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