Zimbabwe agreed on Wednesday to pay $ 3.5 billion in compensation to white farmers whose land was expropriated by the government to resettle black families, taking another step further to resolve one of the most divisive policies of the Robert Mugabe era.
But the southern African nation does not have the money and will issue long-term bonds and jointly approach international donors with farmers to raise funds, according to the compensation agreement.
Two decades ago, the Mugabe government carried out violent evictions of 4,500 white farmers and redistributed the land to some 300,000 black families, arguing that it was redressing colonial imbalances.
The agreement signed at the offices of President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s State House in the capital Harare showed that white farmers would be compensated for the infrastructure on the farms and not for the land itself, according to the national constitution.
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Mnangagwa said Wednesday’s deal was “historic in many ways.”
“It brings closure and a new beginning in the history of the land discourse in Zimbabwe,” said Mnangagwa.
“The process that has led us to this event is equally historical, since it is a reaffirmation of the irreversibility of the land, as well as a symbol of our commitment to constitutionalism, respect for the rule of law and property rights”, said.
Signature Policy
Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube said at the signing ceremony: “In the agreement we have given ourselves 12 months to run around the world, around Zimbabwe, to think of ways to raise these funds. We are determined to do so. It is also about promises, not necessarily cash on the table. It is about commitment. “
Details of how much money each farmer or his descendants could earn, given the time that has passed since the farms were seized, were still unclear, but the government has said it will prioritize the elderly in making settlements.
Farmers would receive 50 percent of the compensation after one year and the balance within five years.
Ncube and acting Agriculture Minister Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri signed on behalf of the government, while farmers’ unions and a foreign consortium that carried out assessments also drafted the agreement.
“As Zimbabweans, we have chosen to solve this longstanding problem,” said Andrew Pascoe, head of the Union of Commercial Farmers who represents white farmers.
Land seizures were one of Mugabe’s distinctive policies that deteriorated ties to the West. Mugabe, who was deposed in a coup in 2017 and died last year, accused the West of imposing sanctions on his government as punishment.
The program still divides public opinion in Zimbabwe, as opponents see it as a partisan process that left the country struggling to feed itself. But his supporters say he has empowered landless blacks.
Mnangagwa said that land reform could not be reversed, but that paying compensation was key to repairing ties to the West.
Zimbabwe launched controversial land reforms in 2000 when ZANU-PF party activists and liberation veterans of the 1970s seized large swaths of farms.
Mugabe justified land grabbing as a way to correct historical errors by calling for the return of land that was forcibly taken from the nation’s blacks.
Critics blame Mugabe’s land program for wreaking havoc on the agricultural sector, a mainstay of the economy. Economic output was cut in half after land seizures, and the economy has been affected since then.
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