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Government has ordered people illegally occupying farms countrywide to vacate the properties or risk forcible eviction. Lands and Rural Resettlement Minister Douglas Mombeshora on Tuesday said Government would not allow illegal settlement, especially where it negatively affected productivity.
Police have already started evicting hundreds of illegal settlers in Masvingo.
“People who are illegally staying on indigenously-owned farms across the country should leave those properties or else they will be moved out. We cannot allow a situation where a black-owned farm is occupied and taken over by those in need of land.
“ If we do that, we will be defeating the whole objective of empowering indigenous people. In the event that there are plans to take over such a farm, compensation should be paid fully first for improvements on that property before take over for resettlement purposes, said Minister Mombeshora.
He said people fronting for white former farmers would lose their properties for redistribution to landless people.
Online Reporter