By Sifelani Murambiwa in Chiredzi
Zimbabwean Villagers from Chisa Communal Lands under Chief Chisa are migrating to Mozambique protesting against government delays in resolving a boundary dispute with Gonarezhou National Park.
The subjects claim the national park was fenced in 2008 depriving them pastures as it is over the original boundary eating into their ancestral land.
The Shangani speaking people claim full ownership of the 12 km piece of land which was fenced off by the national park in 2008.
They claim that the area, which encompasses Chiwonja Mountains, home to their ancestral spirits since 1965 when they crossed into the country from Mozambique, was reserved for them by the Smith regime, but later taken away from them by the present government soon after independence.
The clan has been fighting for the return of their fore fathers’ land since then.
The area stretches from Ndali, which is 80 km from Chiredzi urban, to Chiwonja Mountains at the border with Mozambique.
The clan, led by their chief, Johane Ndali said Zimbabwe will lose livestock as they are migrating with their cattle, goats and sheep and will trade with Mozambique’s.
“We brought the matter last month to the Deputy Minister of Agriculture Cde Paddy Zhanda when he visited us last month but nothing meaning has been done towards helping us retrieve our grazing land which we were robbed when the park was fenced.
“The fence now denies us access to our ancestral mountain of Chiwonja and we can’t continue to face this misery hence the decision to migrate backwards to Mozambique. We have large herds of cattle which need more grazing land in this desert like area so when authorities grab our land it means we must move out,” said Chief Chisa.
The fights however saw villagers at one point taking law into their own hands, cutting and rolling away the security fence so that their cattle would get in for grazing.
Several villagers were arrested for destruction of property up until Chief Chisa barred them from invading the park’s new perimeter.
The Chief said people from Mozambique are now taking advantage of this chaos and are charging two beasts per year from every herd that they keep in their country.
“Our neighbours on the Mozambican side are now getting rich because they are charging us two beasts of cattle from every herd that we request them to graze in their area. This is giving us more questions as to what wrong have we done to our own government which is punishing us like this? Smith used to have his boundary 12 km away from us but our government in an independent Zimbabwe is taking land from us,” said Chief Chisa.
The Zimbabwean government however fenced Gonarezhou National Park to protect villager’s who were losing livestock from predator attacks and preventing the transmission of diseases such as anthrax from wildlife to livestock.
Comments
About Author
