Zimbabwe's police yesterday continued to demolish hundreds of homes erected by war veterans and other squatters on properties on the southern edge of Harare. However, this new development does not appear to indicate a significant change in President Robert Mugabe's campaign against white-owned farms.
Scores of squatters hurriedly carried away mattresses, clothes and other belongings and then watched dejectedly as police tore down their newly-erected structures. More than 500 armed police destroyed hundreds of homes in the Kambuzuma township, south of Harare. Brick houses were knocked down and wooden huts burned. It was the first major police action against the veterans of the war against Rhodesian minority rule since they and other Mugabe supporters began invading and occupying white-owned farms in February. However, the police actions this week do not appear to be the beginning of a nation-wide crackdown on the farm invaders. Police said they were taking the action because the farms on Harare's outskirts - including one owned by Rothmans of Pall Mall - were illegally occupied by war veterans and then sold in plots to Harare residents. Harare City Council repeatedly warned the veterans not to profiteer from the situation. The council said it was not legal to subdivide the property because it does not have water or sewage facilities for residential development.
Hundreds of angry war veterans gathered yesterday at Mr Mugabe's offices in Harare to protest at the police action.
"Whoever authorised the destruction of our houses must be an MDC sympathiser," said war veteran Mr Richard Mapangura, alleging the police were acting in concert with the opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change. "We want to be addressed by President Mugabe." By late yesterday Mr Mugabe had not addressed his supporters.
The police also dismantled illegal roadblocks erected this week on a major thoroughfare leading north of Harare and arrested 23 war veterans who had stopped traffic.
The recent police actions do not, however, indicate a renewed commitment to the rule of law. The evictions and arrests were directed against a small band of war veterans who have repeatedly flaunted government orders. No action has been taken against thousands more veterans who are illegally occupying more than 1,400 farms across the country.
"We have no indications of thorough and widespread change and there are new invasions of farms still going on,["] said a spokesman for the Commercial Farmers Union (CFU) which represents Zimbabwe's 4,500 mostly white farmers.
Zimbabwe's police also indicated that they do not intend to evict war veterans from all the farms they currently occupy.
Nor do the police actions signal any change in the Mugabe government's plans to seize more than 3,000 white-owned farms covering five million hectares, and turn them over to poor blacks. The government is proceeding to issue compulsory acquisition orders to take 804 farms as the first phase in implementing these plans.