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the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Agriculture, Water, Lands and Resettlement Minister Biti said there were some farmers who were inflating the tonnage of grain delivered. The grain was delivered under the strategic reserve.
Chikomba Central legislator, Mr Moses Jiri (MDC-T) chairs the committee.
“The culture of honesty has been devalued in our country. Yes there are farmers who delivered grain but kune mamwe makoronyera who want to reap where they did not sow,” Minister Biti said.
He said Cabinet had seen a report by the Comptroller and Auditor General which exposed shady dealings at GMB.
“It is a disaster, the report was an indictment on GMB. The authenticity of what farmers are owed becomes questionable. It is horrible, we can’t have an important institution being vandalised like that.
“It is urgent that we unbundle GMB to make it profitable because where we have privatised we have done well. The institution is overstaffed with a wage bill of US$10 million,” Minister Biti said.
He said Treasury, GMB and the Ministry of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development will have to agree on a number of issues before the farmers were paid.
Minister Biti said they will have to agree on the exchange rate to be used because the grain was delivered before the introduction of the use of multiple currencies in the economy.
He said they will also have to agree on a payment plan considering that Treasury was facing financial challenges. Minister Biti said Vice President Joice Mujuru was correct when she said there were Cabinet Ministers who looted farm inputs this farming season.
“There are Cabinet Ministers who looted inputs. If you see the whole Vice President (Mujuru) talking about it, who am I to dispute it. There has been a shortage of Ammonium Nitrate, the reason isn’t because we didn’t buy fertiliser.
“There are people who have stolen AN from the GMB. Some people who sit in Cabinet were just driving their big cars to the GMB to loot the inputs. If a list of the beneficiaries was to be produced it will be of who is who in Zimbabwe,” Minister Biti said.
He said there was need for Government to expedite the process of giving collateral value to the land. Minister Biti said without collateral value, land was dead capital without value.
“Let us empower the new farmers by giving them leases. The State has to give leases whether 99-year leases, I don’t care. Land has to be securitised because it is an asset with three components, which are use value, productive value and exchange value.
“The problem at the moment is that our land has no exchange value. If you can give someone a 99-year offer letter surely why not give a lease to that person because obviously not many people are going to reach 99 years,” he said.
He said the State will not be able to finance agriculture because it was a business. Leases, Minister Biti said, will help farmers access funding from financial institutions.
Minister Biti castigated the parties in the Inclusive Government for failure to put people’s interests first.
He said they had failed as the leadership to concentrate on issues that affected the general populace by putting much effort in political bickering.
Minister Biti said there was need for the inclusive Government to have a common vision to develop Zimbabwe.
Online Reporter