Zanu-PF speaks on land reform

In its manifesto for the harmonised elections launched by President Mugabe last week, Zanu-PF said the indigenisation of land had far reaching implications for the programmes the party would embark on in the next five years.

“One clear current achievement of Zanu-PF, whose benefits have become self-evident and widespread, with far reaching positive implications over the next five years is the indigenisation of land and the empowerment of newly resettled farmers,” reads the party manifesto.

“The real development impact of the indigenisation of land has been employment creation and the opening up of new livelihood opportunities. In total, some 1 717 093 real sources of livelihood have been created over the last decade by the historic indigenisation of land under Zanu-PF.”

Under the A1 farming model 81 375 permanent jobs were created while under the A2 model 178 107 have been established.
Seasonal employment opportunities have also been created for 309 225 people under the A1 model while 138 459 have been created under the A2 scheme.

A total of 976 500 and 113 802 individuals have benefited from the land reform programme under the A1 and A2 schemes respectively.
Prior to the land reform programme only 348 000 people were employed or had their livelihoods supported by land.

Beneficiaries of the land reform programme also ventured into tobacco farming that had hitherto been the preserve of only 1 547 white commercial farmers.
A total of 170 million kilograms of tobacco were expected at the auction floors this selling season.

Farmers resettled under the AI scheme have benefited from 4 million hectares of land while A2 farmers have received a total of 3, 5 million hectares.
The land reform programme has also been cross cutting with 36 343 war veterans, 14 537 women, 727 youths and 130 109 others benefiting from the programme.

Zanu-PF has promised to increase support to resettled farmers if it wins the elections to increase productivity.
Apart from land for farmers Zanu-PF has also acquired peri-urban land for development of low and middle income housing.

“This has given real hope to many hitherto homeless urban dwellers on the housing waiting list whose backlog stands at 1, 25 million. The success of this programme has been threatened by corrupt urban councils run by opposition formations,” the manifesto reads.

Zanu-PF added that after the elections the priority will be on providing security of tenure to the urban beneficiaries of land reform.
“This will be accompanied by rehabilitation of Zimbabwe’s physical and social infrastructure through funding to be unlocked from indigenisation and empowerment assets.

“As such urban voters especially those on the growing housing waiting lists — have a clear and urgent reason to vote for Zanu-PF to ensure that they benefit from the success of the indigenisation of land from peri-urban farms that have been earmarked for massive housing development,” reads the manifesto.