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Tichaona Zindoga Senior Features Writer
Shurugwi District of the Midlands province is a rich area, largely. With abundant mineral wealth as it sits atop the Great Dyke, it is home to abundant gold deposits for which the area is rather notorious for illegal miners commonly known as makorokoza.The Shurugwi “korokoza” is well known to be passionate, industrious and resourceful, while he may also choose to kill for the precious stone when the evil need arises.

Shurugwi is also a farming area with rich soils and a lot of fertile, verdant land.

The farming areas receive generous rains.

As has happened this year, which to the farmer is the natural lubrication that sensualise the passion and water the intercourse with the land.

When The Herald visited the area recently, it was all typical Shurugwi.
Only in the Ward 17 Totonga area things were not normal, at least for hundreds of young men and women who have set base at John Anderson Farm, also known as Corrangamite Farm, and are demanding land for resettlement.

Theirs is another story of passion, which can well turn into something notorious if not properly handled.

They want land.

They have been promised the land.

The land they do not look like they will get, anytime soon, though.

They are feeling betrayed.

Maybe they have been betrayed.

They are seeing greed all over.

Lovemore Maketo is the leader of about 700 mostly young men and women from the surrounding “villagised” resettled farms that include Kurland, Beaconcop, Dumelani, Manokore, A1, A2 and A3.

He believes he can lead the people into some Promised Land of land ownership and practice of agriculture, well clean of illegal gold panning activities, and away from the congestion of the villages.

Corrangamite was not an accident
“In 2000 when the land reform programme was ongoing we were told that there would not be A2 farmers but A1s only,” he explains the genesis of the potentially explosive situation.

A1 and A2 denote commercial and small-scale farm size respectively.

“We also wanted A2 farms but as the community we were told that we could only be allocated land in the villagised areas.
“However, we were surprised in May 2013 when Dr Farai Marikano started building a house at Corrangamite Farm, extending his area to cover three paddocks and bordering another farmer Dr Francis Mbengo, who had held land to that point,” he said.

The local community was stunned and angry.

They have no issue with the white farmer at John Anderson, who has already given up some land for resettlement.

“We approached the Zanu-PF District chairlady Mirirai Tsikira and presented the problem of the community and questioned how one person could be allowed to take more land when we had around 1 000 youths in need of land,” said Maketo.

Tsikira is said to have taken the issue with the District Administrator who in turn referred the matter to the traditional leader of the area Chief Nhema.
On May 5, 2013, relates Maketo, 700 people converged at the farm and set up base in anticipation of given land.

The vigilantes wanted land in the paddock area into which Dr Marikano had allegedly extended from his original peg.

Yet the times were dangerous. The timing of the development was tricky.

It was election time in Zimbabwe. National elections were held in July. Accusations flowed to and from of the land being used as a campaign tool.
On the other hand if the situation were to implode at the time, this could paint a bad picture of the country, it was believe.

“So we were promised to be allocated land soon after elections. The land had become a rallying point for all youths of the area and we discouraged them from going back to the illicit activities so that they could do something legal and productive, which does not harm the environment, too,” Maketo explained.

Meanwhile the chief negotiated with John Anderson for a tract of land to temporarily house the youths and allow them to do market gardening and related projects while the case was being finalised.

Today, that piece of land is all that they have.

The small projects that they have initiated, with a little help from Anderson, have stalled for want of funding.

There are no more than 15 broiler chickens in what was hope to be the poultry project.

The juice making project, for which Maketo even forks his money, is in virtual limbo while the garden is ill-tendered, haphazard and short of inputs.

Many young people have abandoned ship and gone straight down to the rivers to pan for gold, what in this rainy season of plenty. When The Herald visited the area there were about 30 people at the base. Waiting; almost desponding.

But here is the hardest part. There seems to be recognition that the case is not going to be solved any time soon.

“It is complicated,” is how Elias Mupupuni, Ward 17 councillor described it when The Herald tracked him down to the farm. He said the matter would now be handled at the highest levels. His hands are tied. “We went there when the issue began but there has been the involvement of officials from the district so there is nothing I can do now,” he said.

And he sounds pretty ominous when says: “But we cannot go back to jambanja on the farms or else we will be defying Government.” Jambanja is a term for violence and disorder which characterized “invasions” of the earlier era. The youths will not have succor from Mupupuni. They long know it, they revealed, because they suspect that as a holder of a large farmer he frets whenever land reform is concerned.

The District Administrator, Mr Joram Chimedza, washed his hands off the issue.

Contacted for comment, Chimedza said he had not received any formal communication regarding the issue.“I just heard it as you are saying but I never received any formal communication. When we get that communication we investigate and I present a report but that has not happened,” he said, preferring to refer the case to Jason Machaya Midlands Minister of Provincial Affairs.

The group at the farm has been writing letters to Chimedza’s office, among others, though. The group has been looking up to their MP Francis Nhema.
They are waiting on him. They want him to address them. To help them. He won’t. When The Herald contacted him he said that it was the duty of the relevant departments to resolve the issue. “MPs are not members of the land committees,” he said.

Some 150km off at his homestead at Mupambadzire, Chief Gilbert Daidai Nhema said he hoped that the issue would be resolved soon. “We are waiting for the rainy season to end so we address the issue. We want Government to resolve the issue: these are my children and they have approached me asking for help,” said he.

He also disparaged what he saw as greed in land ownership. Meanwhile, Dr Marikano has not rested, even when his stalled house resembles a shipwreck.
He told The Herald that he was ready to move in when the case is finalized arguing that he had done everything above board. “The Ministry of Lands is the one that determines these things and I cannot move a peg without their authority. It is them who put the pegs and review land sizes. “So regarding the issue, I have no special comment really,” he said.

Three eviction orders against the settlers, which The Herald saw have been served, the last one being last November.

For their part, the group has written several affidavits to relevant offices making a case of their own. It has not been able to be told what the New Year holds for the warring parties.

“We will not budge until we get the land. We are even willing to die for this land,” is the bold declaration of Brighton Chinhamo (35), a father of three.
He used to pan for gold and stay in Gweru but came here at the promise of land. “We were spurred by that hope that after elections we would get land. Now we are all focusing on our advisor waiting for the next step,” he said. “Land is important because it is for settlement and productivity and this is better than illegal gold panning,” he explained.