THEFT!
‘My lifetime's work stolen from me’

I Sit and watch helplessly as my lifetime's work is stolen from me.

It matters not that I am an African, that my family has lived in Africa for over 200 years, that I am supposed to rely on the state to protect my human rights: rights to life, liberty, and security of person; to freedom from arbitrary arrest; to a fair trial; to be presumed innocent until proved guilty; to freedom from interference with privacy of one's home and correspondence; to freedom of movement and residence; to asylum, nationality and ownership of property; to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, opinion and expression; to association, peaceful assembly and participation in government; to social security, work, rest, and a standard of living adequate for health and well-being; to education; and to participation in the social life of one's community.

It matters not that I have been abducted, beaten, put in jail, harassed and threatened.

It matters not that I went to court and obtained a High Court Order nullifying my Section 5 and Section 8 orders - which were to allow the government to take away my farm as well as my movable equipment with payment for the "improvements" only at some future date - on Erewhon farm in Raffingora, on July 3.

Minister Ignatius Chombo has issued an instruction allowing his Zanu PF supporters to move onto my farm in defiance of the very laws we elected him to uphold. That instruction has given the people the impression that they can just take anything they like.

My home on Erewhon was broken into recently and the thieves, for that is what they are, sat and drank anything they could find in the house before looting my possessions as well as taking keys to my sheds, office and motor vehicle. They were surprised by my manager arriving home and, to their credit, ran off into the dark leaving behind many things they had not had time to collect.

You see, when a man who is given the task of caring for our people believes he is above the law and issues instructions which are clearly illegal, he allows law and order to break down. We then lose whatever human rights we think we are entitled to and have to face the consequences of that lawlessness.

When lawlessness is rewarded in the manner in which Chombo has done by giving a Mr Matafara, the local Zanu PF district chairman, a plot on my irrigation farm, Nswala, for dislodging me from my home, then the saga will continue. Chombo believes that I should not have any farms, let alone two which I worked for and bought over the last 10 years.

And my sin? I am white, yes, but I am perceived to be a member of the Movement of Democratic Change, and I constantly stand up against him for abusing the rights of the people who live and work around me.

So now that the A2 settlers allocated my two farms, despite the fact that they do not have Section 8s transferring ownership to the state, have not come forward to take up their plots as allocated to them under minister Joseph Made's fast-track resettlement programme, Chombo has told his underlings to arbitrarily get people to settle on my farms to make me leave.

How many more senior Zanu PF people will be allocated a piece of land for favours done for Chombo, not only on my farm but on other farms in the same district as well as the rest of Zimbabwe?

We are watching the unfolding of a horrific scenario. Yes, the commercial farmers were perceived to be wealthy. But what Chombo is now doing with the support of his colleagues in the politburo and Made and Phillip Chiyangwa in particular in this area is this:

The wealth which the commercial farmers held and invested in productive capital, ie seed, fertiliser, chemicals, labour, etc, is being taken away and given to a select few government supporters who are in turn, investing it in consumable capital: Mercedes Benzes, 4x4 vehicles, BMWs, $600 million homes, and that is fine in the short-term but soon these items, which do not generate further capital, will be used up and the nation will starve.

And then the peasants, who have diligently worked for their Zanu PF masters, will no longer get the money or promises they are being given now by Chombo.

And the staff on Erewhon and Nswala who have so diligently worked to keep their homes, jobs, clinics, children's schooling, will just be dispensable as the minister uses people to achieve his goal of removing all opposition. And our nation will starve.

I wonder if Chombo cares?

Jean Simon, Raffingora.

Zimbabwe Independent 9/8/02