Source: Govt’s daunting task on farmer-miner relations | The Herald September 28, 2016

Zvamaida Murwira Senior Reporter
Government faces a daunting task on how to balance the interests of a farmer tilling the land on his farm on one hand and a miner who wants to prospect and extract minerals from the same field. Disputes have emerged, some of them fatal while others have gone unreported of farmer and miner seeking to assert their rights. A farmer, probably armed with an offer letter or better still, a 99-year lease, would feel that he has a legitimate claim over the farm while a miner holding a prospective licence would feel that he or she ought to be given space to do his work on time before the expiry of such a licence.

Both can put up a valid argument premised on the law on why they should proceed with whatever they want to do on the land — unperturbed. What has created a source of consternation particularly to the farmer is mining laws that seem to give precedence to the miner ahead of the farmer.

The Mines and Mining Amendment Bill, currently before Parliament, seems to be the panacea to the disputes between the two whose preoccupation, they would argue, is to serve the country in fulfilment of Government’s economic blueprint, Zim-Asset.

The Bill provides for mechanisms on how such disputes, should they arise, are to be resolved. The Parliamentary portfolio committee on mines and energy conducted public hearings across the country and the farmer/miner disputes was one of the much talked about subjects during the consultations on the Bill.

Places visited include Mberengwa, Hwange, Gwanda, Masvingo, Bindura, Penalonga, Marange and Glendale and in all these areas, people called on the Government to harmonise mining and agricultural laws to ensure that disputes are reduced to a minimum and people concentrate on production.

The committee, chaired by Masvingo Urban MP Dr Daniel Shumba (Zanu-PF) was told that disputes between farmers and miners remained a thorn in the flesh in need of a permanent remedy.

“Let us co-exist. Nobody should be treated as superior over the other. Both of us miner and farmer, we are Zimbabweans working for nation building. All of us here ate sadza that was produced by a farmer to enable us to come for this public hearing and that shows the importance of a farmer,” said Mr Friedrick Marangwanda from Marange district.

Some of the highlights provided by the Bill are that a miner should seek consent from the farmer to prospect in his farm. It also outlined how recourse should be obtained if such consent could not be secured from the farmer. Some of the recourse involves approaching the responsible minister while a Cadastre Registrar has been conferred with a role in trying to narrow the differences between the two.

Cadastre System means a process for manual or electronic management and recording of processes that create mining rights and titles. The Bill provides for distance away from homesteads, dip tanks and other important infrastructures that a prospective miner should observe when he or she wants to put pegs for purposes of prospecting on another’s farm.

A farmer can approach an Administrative Court for compensation against a miner.

“Any owner or occupier of ground who is injuriously affected by the exercise of any rights under any mining rights or title granted under this Act shall be entitled to recover compensation from the person to whom the mining rights or title was granted or in whose favour the mining rights or title was made in such amount as may be agreed upon or, failing such agreement, as shall be determined by the Administrative Court,” reads the Bill.

During the public hearings by the portfolio committee, some farmers were of the view that they should be entitled to a percentage of profits that would accrue from extraction of minerals on their farms while a miner argued that it would not be reasonable.

Miners in Glendale told legislators of ugly scenes in which farmers would remove pegs in protest of the presence of miners on their farms. This, miners argued, not only created tension and fights, but derailed both farming and mining production time. In some instances the dispute spills into courts further draining energy that should be directed to production.

Members of the portfolio committee are expected to table a report before Parliament giving their observations and recommendations on whether the Bill has enough safety measures to clear these disputes on farms.

Mines and Mining Development Minister Walter Chidhakwa is expected to respond to those recommendations when he steers the Bill once Parliament resumes sitting next week. One provision that was hailed by people during consultations was the “use it or lose it” policy, aimed at ensuring that people do not hold mining claims for speculative purposes.

Only time will tell whether the Bill will bring with it finality to the disputes between farmers and miners, and possibly the local community as a whole.