Nyazura farm family forced to flee after mob attack
By Alex Bell
22 July 2011
A farming family in Nyazura has been forced to flee their home on Friday,
after an attack by a mob of land invaders.
The Smit family from De Rust farm has been fighting their illegal eviction
from the property the whole week, after a self-confessed CIO agent called
Onisious Makwengura, plus a gang of thugs, started harassing and
intimidating the family.
Makwengura and his gang have vandalised property on the farm and threatened
the Smit family, insisting he is acting under the orders of top police
officials and the Manicaland governor.
But the situation turned very ugly on Friday after farm owner Koos Smit was
arrested. SW Radio Africa was told that Makwengura gave police a false
statement saying Smit had assaulted him. Smit was arrested and held at
Nyazura police station on assault charges for most of Friday morning.
While he was being detained, Makwengura and his gang broke into the De Rust
farmhouse, where Smit’s wife, Mary Anne and two sons, Michael and Adriaan,
were taking shelter. The mob then started trashing the house, in an effort
to get the rest of the Smit family to leave.
The Smit sons in defence, fired gun shots into the air as a warning. But the
shots prompted Makwengura and a fellow invader to draw their own weapons and
threaten the Smits. The Smit sons then fired a number of rounds into the
floor, in an attempt to keep the mob away from them and their mother.
While this was happening a neighbour, hearing the gun shots, called the
police who rushed back to the farm. But when they got there they did not
arrest any of the land invaders and instead took away the Smit’s weapons and
told them to flee. The police apparently said they could not guarantee their
safety and said they would be killed if they remained.
The family was allowed to leave with only one vehicle and a suitcase each.
Makwengura apparently refused to let them take anything else, saying he was
keeping the remaining vehicles as “compensation” for the damage inside the
farmhouse.
Koos Smit was later released from Nyazura police station after his family
was run off the property. They are now the third family in the district to
be forced off their property in this manner. A fourth farmer has negotiated
a 30 day period to ‘voluntarily’ leave his farm.
A source told SW Radio Africa on Friday that the Smit family, along with the
Grobler family who were also evicted from their property by Makwengura, are
seeking urgent outside intervention. The source explained that both families
have been left with nothing, and all they want is justice to prevail.