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Africa Moyo in BRAZZAVILLE, Congo

Vice President Kembo Mohadi has promised to ensure the creation of a special dispensation to enable Zimbabweans in the diaspora to speedily access land and other services they seek back home to deepen their participation in national development.

Speaking on Thursday night here during an interactive engagement with Zimbabweans living in the Republic of Congo, VP Mohadi started his address by an outline of the sanctions the country is grappling with and then the developments achieved by the Second Republic since 2017.

He said he was proud to be engaging the professionals, an indication that they benefited from Zimbabwe’s sound education.

“It is because of our education system that you are here and running a regional office,” he said.

Turning to the economy, VP Mohadi said Zimbabwe had suffered for a long time due to the sanctions imposed by the West in retaliation to the Land Reform Programme that started in the year 2000.

“Lots of bad things have been said about Zimbabwe to the extent that we no longer care. We are not liked because in Africa, we are the only country that decided to take back our land. For that we were regarded as truant and deserved to be punished through sanctions so that any other country that decided to take back land will think twice,” he said.

Since 2017, VP Mohadi said the country has been trying to move forward in the face of climate change and the illegal sanctions.

He said Government resolved that dams should be constructed to ensure adequate water for irrigation even if it did not rain. This saw the construction of dams such as Muchekeranwa, Marovanyati, Chivhu and Lake Gwayi-Shangani, among others.

“Gwayi-Shangani was mooted in 1912 and since then, all administrations were scared of implementing it but when we came in, we took the bull by the horns and it is now 80 percent complete and it shall turn Matabeleland North down to Bulawayo into a greenbelt,” he said.

Investments were also made into the construction and expansion of roads and airports to facilitate the smooth flow of goods to other markets, said VP Mohadi.

Due to sanctions, all the developments are being done using local resources as Zimbabwe cannot access funding from multilateral financial institutions.

VP Mohadi challenged the diasporans and other young people to love their country and “be committed and prepared to die” for it.

“You are the candidates to run our country. We liberated it, and now fight for economic independence. Forget political emancipation, we achieved it; it is your turn to liberate Zimbabwe economically,” he said.

The diasporans wanted to know how they could get land while some spoke about their travel challenges when coming to Brazzaville from Harare and requested that Air Zimbabwe resumes flights to the DR Congo. Kinshasa and Brazzaville are close and located on the opposite sides of the Congo River.

Former Permanent Secretary for Lands, Agriculture, Water and Rural Resettlement, Dr John Basera, said during his time in the Ministry, they had over 250 000 applications for land including from the diaspora.

He said some were going to be allocated land in Masvingo and Kanyemba where greenbelts were being created.

VP Mohadi said he had received numerous reports from the diasporans who said they applied for land but had not received any communication.

He then directed staff in his office to ensure they engage the Ministry of Lands so that a special dispensation was created for the diaspora.

Mr Tafadzwa Dube asked if there could be special investment zones and VP Mohadi said they already exist, offering tax-free holidays, “unless you say we should have the Chinese model of Diaspora Special Economic Zones”.

Mr Dube also said they were being ridiculed over the national team’s inability to play home games in Zimbabwe due to lack of bucket seats in stadiums.

VP Mohadi said it was indeed an embarrassment but promised to ensure the challenge was rectified.

Meanwhile, VP Mohadi left Brazzaville for home yesterday.