/ 20 September 2000

ZIM FARMERS WELCOME POLICE ACTION

ZIMBABWE’S commercial farmers have welcomed the eviction of war veterans from five white-owned farms and urged President Robert Mugabe to restore order on hundreds of other occupied farms. Armed police this week destroyed shacks and evicted hundreds of black liberation war veterans and their supporters from five farms outside the capital Harare, police said. Government officials were unavailable to comment on the rare show of force against liberation war veterans at the centre of Mugabe’s controversial land seizure campaign. Chenjerai Hunzvi, leader of the country’s war veterans association, denounced the police action. ”It shows that they are puppets of the white commercial farmers and their Western imperialist masters,” said Hunzvi, who was elected as a ZANU-PF member of parliament in June. Since June, Mugabe’s government has served notice to acquire more than 2 000 of the 3 041 white-owned farms earmarked for resettlement and passed legislation absolving it of responsibility to pay compensation. – Reuters

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