🇿🇼 Zimbabwe to compensate white farmers who lost land in seizures 20 years ago

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — Zimbabwe says it will compensate local and foreign white farmers who lost land and property more than 20 years ago in farm seizures meant to redress some of the wrongs of colonialism.

About 4,000 white farmers lost their homes and swathes of land when the Black-majority country’s then-president, Robert Mugabe, launched the often-chaotic redistribution program in 2000, which turned violent at times. Mugabe, who died in 2019, said it was aimed at addressing colonial-era land inequities after the southern African nation gained independence from white minority rule in 1980.

Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube announced Wednesday at a meeting with diplomats that his government approved 441 applications for compensation worth $351.6 million from local white farmers and 94 applications from foreigners worth $196.6 million, but only 1%, or $3.5 million, will be paid in cash to local farmers who lost land. The balance, Ncube said, will be paid through the issuance of treasury bonds.

Foreigners will receive an initial $20 million to be shared equally among the 94 claimants from Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland and several countries in eastern Europe, he said.

White farmers who owned the majority of prime farmland were removed from their farms, often forcibly by violent mobs led by veterans of the country’s 1970s independence war. Some farmers and their workers died or were seriously injured in the violence that included beatings and rape, according to Human Rights Watch.

The seizures badly impacted commercial farming, forcing a country that was a key regional food producer and exporter to rely on assistance from donors. Zimbabwe’s agriculture sector has rebounded in recent years, but recent droughts are now the main challenge.

https://apnews.com/article/zimbabwe-white-farmers-land-colonialism-mugabe-8ef1747c1f02d92487b0c47bb1be1f4d

Black students in South Africa, all born long after apartheid and with every government benefit in their favour, gleefully chant about killing whites.
There’s no fixing this.

🔗 Rieb van Janbeeck