As storm clouds rumble over the rolling hills of Raffingora, Mr Richard Brooker and his black farm manager, Mr Stanley Damuson, grimly discuss how to keep the tobacco farm functioning in the face of its occupation by black supporters of President Robert Mugabe. The Brooker farm was invaded last week by a gang of 170 men wearing T-shirts emblazoned with the face of the president. They also carried truncheons with which they bludgeoned two farm employees.
The sound of drumbeats comes from where the squatters are constructing huts on the Brooker farm. They have been drumming and singing throughout the night to intimidate the Brookers and their staff. Here in the heart of Zimbabwe's tobacco-farming country, 130 km north of Harare, whites and blacks alike are suffering the effects of Mr Mugabe's decision to send supporters to seize whiteowned farms. Over the past two weeks thousands of blacks have overrun more than 250 farms and claimed them as their own. So far Zimbabwe's police have refused to take any action against the farm invaders despite scores of incidents where people have been beaten, property stolen or destroyed and crops ruined.
A gang of about 200 squatters prevented visitors from going to the Brooker farm in the morning but by the afternoon the invaders had moved to a different part of the sprawling 1,500 hectare property and it was possible to enter.
Mr Brooker stayed on his farm throughout the guerrilla war against white Rhodesian rule and he continued on after Zimbabwe became independent.
"Our movements are restricted. Our workforce is being intimidated but they are still working to reap and cure the crop," he said. "I feel particularly bad for them because they are caught in the middle and they are being squeezed. The invaders are trying to turn them against us."
Two of his employees were beaten by the squatters, who accused them of supporting the opposition to Mr Mugabe's government. One, Mr Arab Singano, a teacher who runs the farm school for the children of Brooker's 180 employees, was beaten with rubber truncheons by a group of the squatters. The invaders said they were punishing Mr Singano because he had campaigned for voters to reject Mr Mugabe's draft constitution. The draft constitution would have authorised the government to confiscate white-owned farms without paying compensation, but it was defeated in the February referendum.
"The gang assaulted him with baton sticks," said Mr Damuson, himself a black Zimbabwean. "They warned him if he did not join them, then he would suffer more . . . They are going after anyone who supports the opposition. They have seized T-shirts for the MDC" (the Movement for Democratic Change, Zimbabwe's main opposition party).
Thirteen farms surrounding the Brookers' are also occupied. The drumming has carried on throughout the night on the properties, sometimes right at the houses. Some farmers have been forced to sign papers declaring they will donate their properties to the squatters. In Karoi and Kwekwe homes have been stormed. The police have stood by passively. Mr Mugabe stated unequivocally that his government would not take action against the squatters.
The farm invaders say they are veterans of the war against white Rhodesian rule. But in the Raffingora area only a handful were actually war veterans who came from Harare wearing brightly-coloured suits, carrying cell phones and driving government-registered vehicles. They recruited a few hundred young, unemployed men from the nearby rural areas.
"We will continue with this fight until the land is back to its rightful owners. We support the stance taken by our President, Comrade Mugabe, and there is no turning back," said Mr Chenjerai "Hitler" Hunzi, in a rally before thousands of supporters in Harare. "We will take the land by all means, even if that means by force of arms."
Mr Mugabe came to power in 1980 on promises to redistribute white-owned farms to poor blacks. The land was seized from Africans during Rhodesian colonial rule. Mr Mugabe insists that Britain must pay compensation to the current white owners, or else they will not get paid for the land at all.
With parliamentary elections due in April and the popularity of his government at an all time low, Mr Mugabe has encouraged the seizures of the white farms, apparently to win renewed support from rural Zimbabweans. But he is taking a huge gamble with the country's economy, which depends on tobacco for 40 per cent of its export earnings. Tobacco is left rotting in the fields because of disruptions to the critical reaping and curing.
It is estimated that the farm invasions have already caused losses of more than Z$400 million ($11 million) and the toll is rising. "Our losses are going up by the hour," said Mr Brooker.
Mr Mugabe is also leading a breakdown of respect for law and order, which could well have disastrous consequences for the country.
"How much more trespassing, violence and intimidation is it going to take before the police do anything?" asked Mr Jerry Grant, of the Commercial Farmers' Union.