The seizure of white-owned farms - the so-called land reform programme that has reduced Zimbabwe from the breadbasket of Africa to a land of hungry and desperate people - is still being relentlessly pursued by Mugabe's supporters.
At the weekend, one of the President's noisiest lieutenants, Minister of Trade and Industry Obert Mpofu, vowed to clear out the remaining 35 white farmers in his constituency imminently.
At a meeting in the Bubi-Umguza district in Matabeleland North, in the south of the country, Mpofu accused local civil servants of taking bribes from the white farmers to delay any action against them.
And he threatened that if there was more resistance to eviction he would send in 'state machinery' - by which he meant paramilitary forces - to enforce it. |
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Minister Obert Mpofu has vowed to clear out the remaining white farmers in his district |
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Last month, a group of heavily armed police invaded the white-owned farm Portwe Estates in the Bubi district. The owners resisted, and the matter has gone to court in Bulawayo. But police officers remain camped on the land.
Mpofu is particularly angry that the 35 white farms remain in his Bubi-Umguza constituency because, ironically, this is one of the very few rural constituencies where there is still strong support for Zanu-PF, the governing party.
Mugabe began the land-grabs seven years ago, when Zimbabwe had more than 4,000 white-owned farms. Today, there are less than 100. Most of the seized farms have been handed over to high-ranking police and army officers, as well as senior government members and officials. 
FIRST POSTED APRIL 20, 2007
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