Zimbabwe land reforms target wildlife reserves
AFP/File
– Wed Mar 9, 5:55 am ET
HARARE (AFP) – Zimbabwean authorities will force the country’s predominantly
white wildlife park owners to join with black partners in a new round of
controversial land reforms, state media said on Wednesday.
“Government is now implementing the wildlife-based land reform policy after
five years of resistance from conservancy owners,” The Herald newspaper
reported.
“This will see 59 indigenous people getting leases from the government or
sharing conservancies with white former owners.”
Parks and wildlife authority director-general Vitalis Chadenga said the
project was “one of the unfinished businesses of the country’s land reform
programme.”
Under land reforms launched by long-time President Robert Mugabe in 2000,
Zimbabwean authorities seized farms from thousands of white owners in what
Mugabe called a correction of historical imbalances in the former British
colony.
The often chaotic and violent land reforms, led by pro-Mugabe militants,
were blamed for a food crisis in the one-time regional breadbasket as the
majority of new owners lacked the means and skills to farm.