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Fortious Nhambura Senior Features Writer
Seventeen years ago the people of Svosve armed with hoes and axes moved into the Ruzawi commercial farming belt east of the Mashonaland East provincial capital, Marondera. The villagers were determined to reclaim their ancestral land expropriated from their forefathers by the settler regime. The 1998 historic occupation ignited the land invasions that gave in to the fast track land reform exercise.

The late Chief Svove, Enock Gahadza Zenda, with his people moved into farms surrounding their area in protest over delays in returning arable land to the indigenes.

Just like any other black community, the Svosve people were bundled of their land into a rocky barren area to make way for white farmers. The area, notorious of its born-hard terrain, often characterised by rocky outcrops, boulders, steep slopes and shallow sandy soils had become an impediment to their development as it could not sustain meaningful agriculture.

With their belongings on their heads and on bicycles, nearly 4 000 peasants trekked from their communal areas to claim a stake on four sprawling white-owned farms. The villages were from Magorimbo, Mupazviriho, Chematanda, Kanjiva and Nyabonde, Choto, Mumvuma and Mareverwa among others.

Their push statement was, “we are returning to our fatherland”.

Cde Nicholas Magorimbo, one of the villagers who took the bold step to occupy Bruce Farm, says theirs was “no mischief but a genuine cry for arable land”.

“We refused to be squatters on our land. We were a people in need of farming land. From this rocky semi-arid area, where we were packed like mice in hole, a decision was made under the leadership of the late Chief Svosve Enock Gahadza Zenda to occupy the white commercial farms and demand what was ours,” he said.

They had the support and guidance of local sprit mediums as they advanced to Daskop Farm.

The owner of the farm resisted even after we had showed him the grave of our grandparents and where they used to grind their rapoko and corn. We had to sing and beat drums at the farmhouse yard until the owner left,” he said.

Mrs Modester Kamukosera said they were driven into the implosion by the deplorable conditions in the villages.

“The population in the village was growing while our land remained small and unproductive. We wanted to know why blacks were still packed in these rugged areas while the settlers continued to enjoy. A decision was unanimously taken to repossess the land taken from our forefathers.

“We took the initiative for the good future generations. We were not worried even if we were to die for this noble cause that will be a history to children. All the adults went and encamped on the farms with the school-going children and the elderly remaining behind to tend the animals and attend school,” she said.

Village head Mr Amon Magorimbo concurred with Kamukosera saying theirs was a demonstration of the growing need for equitable land redistribution.

“We demanded that whites vacate the land. When they refused we would dance and beat drums all day at their homestead until they left. Once they left we demarcated the land among our people. We refused to named squatters. We told them we were Zimbabweans on our land. The villagers were resolute because we knew the land was one of the grand reasons for the liberation struggle.

“I am no beneficiary of the resettlement programme but am grateful that we lit the fire for the latest revolution,” he said.

History now has it that the Svosve people under the late Chief Svosve, Enock Zenda, led the first land occupations moving into neighbouring commercial farming lands. One by one, farms in the area where occupied starting with Daskop, Igava, Daskop and Homepark, by villagers fleeing from the unproductive and barren Svosve communal lands.

The occupations were only halted by the intervention of Government through the late Vice President Simon Muzenda, who asked the villagers to vacate the farm and await an orderly land redistribution programme.

The seeds of the Third Chimurenga had been sown. The Svosve farm occupations shook the white community which though that it would still thwart the people’s hunger for arable land by pegging the land beyond the Government’s reach under the willing buyer willing seller clause.

Similar occupations were reported in Nyamandlovu, Karoi and Mukarakate among many areas.

The communal people could no longer sustain land-based livelihoods from the reserves. Research shows that communal lands were never meant to sustain viable agriculture but meant create a pool for cheap labour to work in the surrounding farms.

As Admos Chimhowu and Phil Woodhouse wrote in a research title “Officially’ Forbidden but Not Suppressed: Vernacular Land Markets on Communal Lands in Zimbabwe: A Case Study of Svosve Communal Lands, Zimbabwe”, “ . . . like other native reserves, conditions in Svosve were strenuous and meant to ensure reproduction of labour and its circulation in service of the settler. It was carved out to ensure viable livelihoods would not affect the ability of local farms to acquire labour . . . ”

In response to the occupations Government swung into action launching the “accelerated” land redistribution programme in mid July. From then on, land tenure in Zimbabwe was to be altered for good.

Beginning in 2000, the Government went on an accelerated land redistribution that so it acquiring nearly 11 million hectares of farmland and redistribute it on a massive scale to deserving indigenous farmers.

To date, over 300 000 indigenous farmers have been settled on commercial land in two types of settlement; creating “A1” farms of six hectares to smallholders by dividing up large white farms, while the “A2” model sought to create large black commercial farms.

The land reform transferred the bulk of arable land to black farmers, 70 percent of which was owned by a mere 6 000 white commercial farmers.

The majority of the A1 farmers (including a significant number of women beneficiaries of the land reform) emerged as successful small commercial producers, breaking into markets once white-dominated sectors such as tobacco, maize, soya and barley, mainly as contract farmers.

The beneficiaries say they are on the farms for forever and nothing will separate them from the land their inheritance. They say independence has been consummated as they now own the means of production.

Reigning Chief Svosve Gahadza, Kumuziva Sakirai says they are on the farms to make a statement indigenous farmers can do it. He said despite the current challenges the people were slowly getting there and were looking to the future with confidence.

“We have made a history as the people of Svosve and indeed Zimbabwe. The land reform programme is a first for Africa and the continent is free to copy.

“We are proud that our forefathers pioneered the successful land reform programme. It was good that the programme was accepted by Government resulting in thousands being empowered. I am happy that the small meeting convened at Dhirihori Business Centre has made a difference to the lives of millions of Zimbabweans.”

He, however, bemoaned people who were holding on to land which they could not use.

“It pains us as pioneers of the programme that some pieces of land are lying idle because the owners are employed elsewhere and cannot concentrate on their farms. Those who have failed must opt out and ensure those who want to use the land get it.

A resettled farmer at Pinewood Farm, Mr Caleb Mareverwa, says the land has given them a new lease of life.

“From that packed village where I had less than two hectares I now have a 36 hectares to farm. I have an orchard, my cattle graze freely and my children are farming here with me. That is the beauty of having land that I was denied by the settler regime. Capital permitting, I have big dreams for this farm,” he said.

Efforts to armtwist Government through sanctions and withdrawal of support to the farming sector have failed. Slowly Government is winning the war as alternative capital is being sourced from elsewhere.

According to ZANU-PF June 2013 Election Manifesto, the fast track land reform programme now employs over 1 717 100 people. Of these, a total of 976 500 are employed under the A1 scheme and the remainder under the A2 model.

Statistics show that the volumes delivered to the country’s tobacco auction floors, mainly from resettled farmers, jumped from a low of 48 million kilogrammes in 2008 to 185 million kilogrammes this year.

The small-scale sector also contributed 80 percent of Zimbabwe’s maize production for the 2013-14 season while marked improvements in small grains, groundnuts and soyabean production have been recorded.

The emergence of the developing economies, the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India and China) has also helped ease capital constraints that were threatening to decapitate the African model empowerment programme and land redistribution exercise.

Only recently President Mugabe commissioned the US$38,6 million worth of equipment, secured from Brazil, that included fertiliser spreaders, tractors and irrigation kits as Government sought to increase pace in achieving targets of the food Security and Nutrition cluster of the ZimAsset blue print.

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